The air in the meeting room was tense as the group of eight sat in their respective positions, each side almost mirroring the other.
On one side of the long conference table sat Aron, his friend and lawyer Felix, and a laptop in front of him displaying a folder labelled “Sensitive Information” on the screen, with a USB flash drive inserted in the computer.
On the other side sat six individuals, including Roxan, head of security at Facebook, and five other people, three of whom were lawyers, and two from the Facebook site security department.
Aron fidgeted in his seat, his eyes darting nervously from the screen to the faces of the people sitting across from him. As both sides prepared to engage in a high-stakes discussion and negotiation.
The sound of shuffling papers and clearing throats broke the silence as the meeting began, and Aron braced himself for what was to come. He took a deep breath, steadying himself as he prepared to share his findings with the group. It was going to be a long day.
‘This is going to take a long time’ Aron sighed while focusing on presenting them an example and after the payment agreement he will give them the rest.
“Here are a few new examples of your system’s vulnerabilities” said while projecting his screen to the wall using a projector.
“We have already tested the ones you sent to us last time, so there is no need to try to show us more, just tell us how many more you have,” Roxan said when he was about to start showing a few more examples.
‘Even better for me as it reduces my stress trying to explain things’ Aron immediately moved to answer her question.
“I currently have more than 1700 vulnerabilities in your system” Answered immediately.
“OH my God” said Roxan under her breath when she heard the answer.
She had expected maybe ten or more since he had already sent 3 of them, but what she heard meant that it was more than she would have ever guessed even in her wildest imagination but Aron didn’t care about that and continued.
“In that, there are about 50 critical-level,150 high-level,500 medium-level, and over 1000 low-level vulnerabilities” continued explaining calmly.
When the Facebook security guys heard that the total number of critical and high level vulnerabilities is over 200, they knew that they need to almost overhaul their entire system to remove these weaknesses and it would take a very long time but not only that it would take a large amount of money.
From just fast calculation Roxan determined that they will need to invest almost 250 million and it will take months to finish this since most of these vulnerabilities are new and they will have to invent the solutions themselves.
But just as she was about to fall into despair a light of hope shined on her as Aron said “I also have their solution but I can only provide it to you if my compensation is doubled and those fees will be negotiated with my lawyer here” while pointing at Felix.
A sigh of relief came out of Roxanas when she heard those words from Aron. She really wanted to hire him into his team but she knew that he wouldn’t want to work for someone when he could earn more from working alone.
What followed next was the negotiation part, which was between Felix and the three Facebook lawyers, since every lawyer wants to get the best deal for his client, because their payment depends on how much they win or how much they save for their clients.
This back and forth continued for two days, they had agreed on the price but they couldn’t come to an agreement when it came to some of the NDA clauses, but they managed to come to terms and signed an agreement.
His payment will be $69million after taxes and lawyer fees. Although his friend denied his offer to pay him $10million stating that he didn’t do much but after back and forth he ended up agreeing to take $5million as a fee.
Although it might seem low compared to what Aron earned but usually the amount they get from this type of deal is only about 1 million, you also have to put in mind that this was Felix’s second official case since his graduation. That means that Felix is the highest paid rookie lawyer in America or I think so.
….
When he arrived at home he asked his parents to have a talk .
….
In the living room.
“You remember when i said i have a meeting with Facebook right”
“Yeah so how did it go? Did you get the job?” asked his mother with enthusiasm.
“No, I wasn’t there for a job meeting. I was there because I found some weaknesses in their app and went to meet them to talk about payment issues,” explained Aron at a level they could understand.
“So did they agree to pay you?” asked his father expecting them to not want to pay his son.
“No, they agreed to pay me, we have already signed a contract and they will forward the payment invoice tomorrow.” he stopped to take a breath and continue
“So, since the money is enough, I wanted to ask you if you want to move house” said Aron and started waiting for the answer
His mother answered “Don’t you need that money for yourself, why would you want to immediately buy a house now”
“You don’t have to worry about money not being enough, they paid me enough to buy a house and more”
“Shouldn’t you use the money to start a business or something, you will need a source of income for the time this money finishes” his mother continued being against it while his father shook his head up and down showing that he agrees with his mother.
“Mom they paid me more than $5million so you don’t have to worry about money shortage for a period of time” he countered, he had to lower the amount given to him or else they will think he is being scammed lest they take him for a fool.
“What!!!, what did you do for them to pay you that much, are you sure it’s not a scam” Asked his father with a look of worry, afraid that his son was being conned.
“No dad you don’t have to worry about it being a scam i went there with a lawyer and we signed a contract so they can’t scam me even if they want because i can sue them”
“If there was a lawyer with you then it’s okay, but since it is your money it’s up to you on how you spend it, but don’t spend it recklessly like those lottery winners understood? ” said his father with a serious expression. Although he felt proud of his son he didn’t want to show it, lest it gets on his son’s head.
“Yes, you don’t have to worry about that, then I’m going forward with buying a house then.”
“Your money is your choice but just be careful like your father said” Finished Aron’s mother while showing pride on her son.
They then continued to have small talk about how his visit went and many small topics until time for dinner came and they all went to eat.
….
Two days later
Aron was currently staring at his phone, on the screen it showed his bank account statement which was..
$69,000,027.
This is the first time his bank account exceeded the thousand dollar mark.
Now that he had already received the money he needed to plan on how to use it very well in order for it to propel him into greatness.
He didn’t pay the school debt immediately, because he was afraid that it would tip the professor that something good might have happened to him and since he didn’t know how powerful the professors’ connections were, he decided to wait for the second meeting about payment negotiation plans in order to do that.
So, his first plan current plan was
Buy a good house and car for his family
Transfer his younger brother to a good school
Upgrade his computer into a personal servers computer
meet Sarah
Make his father quit his job and do what he wants (Since he is rich)
Start a business that can use the program(BugZapper) to its full potential and earn loads of money for him to invest into his future business endeavor’s.
He had more than 5 things he needed to do, but he was happy to do them because if someone told him that his life will start changing 3 days after he was unreasonably expelled from his university 2 days before his graduation and got a quarter a million of student debt out of nowhere, so his current life was pretty good in his eyes.
This doesn’t mean that he was not angry at what happened to him the reason he postponed his investigation revenge planning is because he needed to be in a stable position so that he can plan it peacefully and meticulously.