Ghost: Episode 15

by kaedejun

It’s an exciting turning point as for the first time in this series, I get to see Hyun Min all flustered. Yes – flustered! With the number of subordinates on his side dwindling, and the Three Musketeers getting stronger, it’s only a matter of time before Hyun Min is finally ruined. And this episode, I feel, is the beginning of his end.

What to do now that the handcuffs are on Woo-Young’s wrists!? Woo-Young doesn’t understand the prosecutor’s charges, since he never bugged his office. However, Prosecutor Im claims that Woo-Young dropped it when he visited his office earlier in the day. Flashback!

Woo-Young had gone to Prosecutor Im’s office and waited in the seating area. The secretary had told him that the prosecutor was in a meeting, and would take about 20 minutes. She then received a call and left the office to hand off a file from Prosecutor Im’s desk to another colleague. Alone and unsupervised, Woo-Young sees the open door to Prosecutor Im’s office as an invitation. Don’t do it!!

He checks out the prosecutor’s computers and notices that he’s connected wirelessly to the internet. Before he can look any further, he hears the secretary outside the door. He exits the room as she comes in, and tells her that he’ll wait for the prosecutor outside. Though she doesn’t say anything, it’s too obvious he was in Prosecutor Im’s room. That’s where the good ol’ prosecutor gets the idea that Woo-Young purposely dropped the USB bug in the Jo Jae Min case files then.

Prosecutor Im is also quite thorough – he had his team check out the USB’s serial number and traced it back to the cyber crime team’s equipment. If they get the check-out log for the equipment, they’ll see that Woo-Young took the USB out. One of his men and Kang Mi go to the equipment room to check the log. When they leave, Woo-Young wonders if this is all just a game that the prosecutor is playing.

Woo-Young: “I know something that’s scarier than money. Se Kang Group’s $2 million slush fund from thirteen years ago – are you like this because of that?”

Prosecutor Im warns Woo-Young not to threaten him, as that can be an additional charge against him. Hyuk Joo steps in – he knows who took the bug. Just then, Kang Mi and Prosecutor Im’s man find the check-out log, and discover that it was Hyuk Joo who took it out – not Woo-Young.

It’s a bit of a shocker for Prosecutor Im and Director Jun when Hyuk Joo confesses to taking out the bug and using it illegally. Hyuk Joo admits that it was wrong to do so, but Woo-Young should now be freed because he had nothing to do with it. However, he has no idea why that bug ended up in the prosecutor’s office at all. Since all the evidence is stacked against Hyuk Joo (especially with the check-out log), Prosecutor Im arrests Hyuk Joo, but kindly does not put handcuffs on him since he is a higher ranking officer.

The media has a field day with this – police spying on the prosecutor’s office?! This’ll be headline news!

Woo-Young stops Hyuk Joo just as he heads out the door, wondering what’s going on. Hyuk Joo: “7:39… he knows.”

Director Jun is furious that his team has done something criminal, but Woo-Young argues that Director Jun should now step in and protect his men. He and Hyuk Joo were framed! Woo-Young resolves to get to the truth of the matter, with or without his approval. Director Jun asks about what Woo Young meant earlier by the two million dollars, but Woo-Young refuses to explain. That’s something the director should ask other people about.

Kang Mi and Woo-Young return to the office, working out what “7:39” means. It’s clearly a reference to the CCTV video they were investigating on who came back in to the office and could have stolen the USB. Two people showed up during those times – Sang Woo and Eung Jin. Hyuk Joo was telling them that Sang Woo knows too about the USB bug, and that they should go ask him. They’re not sure if they can trust Sang Woo though, so they decide to hack into his work computer.

Sang Woo comes back to the office and cries in dismay when he sees Woo-Young at his desk, but Kang Mi blocks him from getting nearer. Woo-Young notes that Sang Woo must not have much to hide, since he doesn’t protect his computer with a password. He checks through every single one of Sang Woo’s thorough reports, and his emails – which reveal a ticket to an SNSD concert! Sang Woo: “I went with Hyuk Joo…”

BWAHAHA.

Woo-Young does find one file that’s secret and protected. Sang Woo: “NOOOOOOO!” But too late – Woo-Young clicks the folder. Inside… are pictures of Kang Mi. OH. SO. AWKWARD. I’m dying of laughter here as Sang Woo sheepishly tells Kang Mi, “You were… just… so pretty…” Awww. Woo-Young: “Even though you like pretty girls, and you’re kind of corny, Hyuk Joo said we should trust you.”

They take their meeting outside to a nearby cafe and explain to him what happened to Hyuk Joo. Sang Woo shakes his head – Hyuk Joo keeps doing things that get him in trouble, and nowhere nearer to catching the criminal! He tells them that they were bugging Jae Hee, and Woo-Young reasons that that’s where Hyun Min must have gotten the bug from originally. He asks if they have recordings of the bug, since he needs to prove that the original target for the bug plant was Woo-Young, and not Hyuk Joo. Sang Woo doesn’t have it – but Seung Yoon does.

Speaking of Seung Yoon – that reporter is not the brightest bulb in the world. She seeks out Yeon Joo desperately, wanting her help in writing an article that will exonerate Hyuk Joo. Seung Yoon won’t write it herself because she’s not from a huge, reputable newspaper like Yeon Joo, but if Yeon Joo wrote an article that Hyuk Joo was bugging Yeom Jae Hee from Safe Tech for investigative purposes, then people would listen. Yeon Joo is only intrigued by this development, as it shows that the cyber crime team is totally aware of Hyun Min and his activities. She asks if Seung Yoon has recordings to prove all this, and Seung Yoon gladly hands it over.

You fool! Ahhh if only she knew how evil Yeon Joo is!

Prosecutor Im’s superior is a little nervous about this investigation, as it pits the prosecutors against the police. Prosecutor Im promises to investigate fully, and will take all responsibility for this case. As for Chief Shin, he’s furious that the police were involved in such a criminal activity. It’s hard to help Hyuk Joo at this point because more evidence has been stacked against him. Not only does Prosecutor Im believe that Hyuk Joo bugged his office, but Yeon Joo’s article comes out saying that he also bugged a private company. She basically twisted the recordings and what Seung Yoon told her, and made Hyuk Joo look even worse.

The cyber crime team gets investigated by the prosecutor’s office, having their things all confiscated. Director Jun comes and informs them that the entire team will be relieved of their positions until the investigation is over. Woo-Young hands over his ID first, and quickly at that too. One by one, everyone hands over their ID… but where’s Hye Ram? Anyways, Hyuk Joo is hauled off to the jail where that officer he bullied is there to receive him. Even though Hyuk Joo dares the officer to laugh, he doesn’t, being more fearful and uncertain on how to react.

Seung Yoon calls Yeon Joo for an explanation, but to no avail. She gets a visitor though – Woo-Young! He finds out from her that she no longer has the recording, and Seung Yoon apologizes profusely for having done so. Clearly, it was the stupid thing to do. He asks if she remembers anything from the recordings. She only remembers snippets, such as Nam Sang Won having been murdered, and also that they figured out that Jae Hee knew he was being bugged. Once information about Nam Sang Won was discovered, Jae Hee quickly covered the bug to stop the recording. The day that happened was the same day Jae Min was arrested.

He gets up to leave, and sees her bulletin board for True Story. With a small smile, he encourages her to keep at it, and grow True Story into a big company with a ton of writers and its own building. When he leaves, Seung Yoon can’t shake off the feeling that he’s someone very familiar to her…

Next stop – jail. The holding cell officer sneaks Woo-Young into Hyuk Joo’s cell for just a few minutes. Hyuk Joo wakes up in shock – did Woo-Young get arrested too!? Woo-Young: “Why should I get arrested? I didn’t bug anyone.” He tells Hyuk Joo that a lot of evidence has been stacked against him, even though he wasn’t even the primary target. No matter what happens, he wants Hyuk Joo to just go with the flow, smiling as if nothing is happening.

It’s a weird request, but it’s more for Woo-Young to ensure that Hyuk Joo doesn’t know anything, and acts like he doesn’t know anything.

At a late hour, Sang Woo and Kang Mi drag Tae Gyun out to a cafe and ask him one thing: does he want to get the man who killed Young Suk, and framed Hyuk Joo? Tae Gyun’s a bit confused – isn’t Jae Hee already dead? Woo-Young arrives just in time to nix that thought – the real criminal is still out there. Cy-Team, assemble!

Hyun Min and Director Moon visit Kyung Moon’s grave. Both of them pay their respects, and their deep regret at not having been able to protect Kyung Moon 13 years ago. Both had been out of the country, and were pretty much powerless against Kyung Shin. Now, with Hyun Min as chairman of Se Kang, everything has been put back in their rightful place. The two of them then head to Se Kang Headquarters for Hyun Min’s inaugural ceremony as the new chairman for the group. As they get out of the car, someone watches from afar and makes note of their license plate. It’s Kang Mi! As soon as the valet driver parks the car and hangs the key in its slot, Kang Mi steals it. Her task is to find the SD card of the car’s black box, and make a copy of all the videos recorded in the month of July.

A Se Kang employee escorts two security guards to the 22nd floor, as both of them had received an emergency alarm 10 minutes ago. It is highly possible that an alarm is malfunctioning, since all the executives on that floor are currently at the ceremony. As they go up, the employee asks one of the guards what that briefcase he’s rolling around contains. That guard – Sang Woo! – says that it’s just their kit to check for malfunctions.

It’s just a minute to 9AM, and at Safe Tech, a manager hears that they will get a DDOS attack at 9AM. It would be a virus that their vaccine programs could not catch in time before it would attack at 9. As soon as the clock strikes 9, their site does go down, and the manager immediately calls for a team to go down to the servers and fix the issue.

In comes Woo-Young, just in time with a Safe Tech ID! He introduces himself to the employee manning the servers as someone from the cyber team, and says that his fellow colleagues will be arriving soon. Granted access, Woo-Young rushes to the servers and finds the CCTV Data Server. He gets in touch with Tae Gyun immediately, who’s actually launching the DDOS attack on Safe Tech from a PC cafe!

Safe Tech’s vaccine programs are working swiftly and taking down Tae Gyun’s attack, but Woo-Young asks him to delay it for another ten minutes at least. Woo-Young logs into the computer and copies all the video logs from June 15 to July 16. Meanwhile, Hyun Min has no idea…

Kang Mi finishes making the copy of the SD card, but just as she’s about to put it back, she sees the valet from the rearview mirror. He had realized that the key was missing, and headed out to the parking lot to see if he lost it. Crouching low, Kang Mi tries to put the SD card back into place, though she drops it at first, before the driver can get to her. It’s amazing how he doesn’t see her. When the valet driver reaches the car, he opens the door, and finds the key inside the ignition. He finds it weird, because he swore he could have taken the key out, but he thinks nothing of it, and leaves.

And then we see Kang Mi, crouching outside the passenger side of the car. How she managed to sneak out on the passenger side without attracting attention beats me, but she’s done it!

Meanwhile, Sang Woo’s security guard partner deems that one of the security alarms is malfunctioning. While the Se Kang employee shows him the other security alarms, he has Sang Woo fix the one outside of Director Moon’s office. Sang Woo takes his moment alone to unscrew the hard drive from Director Moon’s laptop and make a copy using his kit.

As Woo-Young’s copies finish transferring to his portable hard drive, he hears footsteps approaching. It’s the real team members from the cyber counterattack team! Though they’re confused when told that someone from their team already came ahead and started working, they don’t think much of it since it’s more important for them to resolve the issue. They enter the server room, and walk right past the CCTV Data servers… where no one is standing. Woo-Young is safe! As he leaves the server room, he passes by one more server tower – the Update Server. Hm… time to check it out!

When Woo-Young finishes completely at Safe Tech, he tells Tae Gyun to clean up as well. Tae Gyun stops his DDOS attack and erases his recent history on that PC cafe computer.

The next day, the press prepare for a conference from Prosecutor Im over the progress in his case. Chief Shin and Director Jun wait nervously and expectantly in their respective offices, just waiting to find out what kind of blow they’re going to get from Prosecutor Im’s findings. Director Jun gets an unexpected visitor in the form of Woo-Young in plain clothes, and holding a small USB. In it, there’s evidence that Hyuk Joo is innocent, and that Prosecutor Im is simply slandering the police. Though he and Director Jun may not trust each other, the evidence is undeniable, and needs Director Jun’s stature to be taken seriously.

Next thing we know, Chief Shin is being informed that Director Jun will be holding an emergency press conference at the same time as Prosecutor Im, thus splitting the press’ attention in two. Yeon Joo attends Director Jun’s press conference, and asks whether Director Jun is holding a simultaneous investigation in the matter to protect his own men. Director Jun simply acknowledges that as a police bureau, their responsibility is to investigate a crime, no matter who committed it. While Prosecutor Im is reporting that there is sufficient evidence showing Hyuk Joo bugging the prosecutor’s office and another private company, Director Jun has one more piece of evidence to show them that proves Hyuk Joo had nothing to do with the USB bug.

How does he know this? The Cy-Team regroups after infiltrating Safe Tech and Se Kang and analyze the material before them. With the CCTV records that Woo-Young took, the team sees Jae Hee covering the bug on June 28th, and hiding it in a coworker’s drawer. Fast forward a couple of weeks and they see Jae Hee take the USB out of his coworker’s drawer on July 16, meaning that it wasn’t at the prosecutor’s office by then. Already, Prosecutor Im is lying on this point.

The likeliest suspect to have transported the USB to Prosecutor Im’s office is Hyun Min. However, based on Hyun Min’s car’s black box records, he didn’t stop by the prosecutor’s office on July 16. So Hyun Min is eliminated from the suspect list. They move on to Director Moon’s hard drive, where there isn’t much information except records and documents regarding Se Kang as a business. But Sang Woo also made a last minute decision to copy his secretary’s computer – and a good thing he did! They find that on her computer calendar, there was a meeting marked off on July 16 at 5PM in Yechon.

While Prosecutor Im is informing the reporters at his conference that Hyuk Joo planted a bug in his office on July 16, Director Jun is explaining at his conference that Hyuk Joo had taken the bug out for investigative purposes against Yeom Jae Hee. Then he shows a CCTV video from a restaurant in Yechon on July 16. First, Jae Hee walks by in the lobby, and then Director Moon passes by as well. Prosecutor Im soon follows, and as he crosses the lobby, he picks up a USB that’s on the floor quite innocently.

That USB is the same one as the bug he claims was planted in the office. The reporters start murmuring – is that USB the same bugging device? If so, it appears that Prosecutor Im brought that bug unknowingly into his own office, and is just blaming the police for it! Only Yeon Joo starts getting nervous about the implications of this evidence, and she asks who provided the anonymous tip; after all, the evidence could have been manipulated.

Instead of answering her question, Director Jun merely says that he would like to know the answer from the prosecutor’s office, and hopes that Prosecutor Im will conduct a thorough investigation. He does acknowledge that Hyuk Joo still committed a crime by illegally wiretapping a citizen for the sake of an investigation, and apologizes on Hyuk Joo’s behalf. However, he does publicly request that the prosecutor’s office reinvestigate thoroughly, and that the cyber team be reinstated to their positions. Victory for Cy-Team!

Hyun Min watches the press conference with increased annoyance. Since the cyber crime department does not have any trace of Safe Tech software, he can’t hack into their files. Therefore he orders Eung Jin to dig up everything he can on the prosecutor. Eung Jin in turn orders Dam Sa Myung and his team of hackers to do so.

Prosecutor Im’s supervisor comes storming in to his office, angry that the prosecutor’s office has been made into a laughingstock. Clearly, everything that Prosecutor Im said was a cock-and-bull story because the bug had ended up in his office entirely through his own fault. The supervisor wants to know just how Prosecutor Im will take responsibility for this, as Internal Investigations has begun looking at Prosecutor Im suspiciously. Looks like someone might get sacked! He orders Prosecutor Im to close the case quietly and to sit back.

Hyun Min and Director Moon visit Safe Tech and speak with the manager there. He wants to know exactly how their CCTV records got out of the building. The manager explains that they had a DDOS attack the day before, and someone had entered their server room during that time. Hyun Min freezes – his own company was hit by a DDOS attack without his knowledge?

Hyuk Joo is released from jail without further ado, and is quickly ushered into a van by Sang Woo. Inside, the Cy-Team has assembled to pick him up. Sang Woo hands Hyuk Joo some white tofu as a congratulations for getting out of jail too – heh! Hyuk Joo’s surprised that he managed to get out, and wonders what Woo-Young must have said to Director Jun. Woo-Young says he didn’t get Hyuk Joo out to help him only, but rather, since they’re all “warmed up” now, they can now begin the real game against Hyun Min. Dun dun dun!

That’s when Hyuk Joo realizes that Kang Mi and Tae Gyun are on their computers, already keeping tabs on their enemy.

Hyun Min asks the manager if the CCTV records is the only thing that the intruder touched during the DDOS attack. After some prodding, the manager admits that the intruder also touched the Update Servers, but he didn’t think Hyun Min had to worry about that. Oh yeah – Hyun Min definitely has to worry about that!

Turns out, when Woo-Young checked out the update server, he planted his tracking virus into the computer. Since the hackers access their targets’ computers through “updates” in their vaccine programs, now whenever they hack into someone’s computer, Tae Gyun will get to see what it is they’re doing and track them down via IP. He gets a hit from someone accessing Prosecutor Im’s computer and starts tracking down their location via IP right away.

Hyun Min realizes this terrible truth at the same time, and calls up Eung Jin immediately. Eung Jin yells at everyone to turn on their wiping programs immediately. They’ve been found out!

Woo-Young then asks for an update on Director Moon’s USB. So far, Sang Woo hasn’t gotten anything yet. It turns out when he made a copy of Director Moon’s hard drive, he also installed a tracking program in Director Moon’s USB so that wherever it got plugged in, they’d find out the IP address. As for Kang Mi, she’s monitoring Hyun Min’s car through its black box, and informs everyone that Hyun Min is at Safe Tech. It’s likely he found out about the tampered update server. That adds to the urgency of the situation, as Hyun Min is likely to destroy the evidence if they don’t hurry up and locate the IP.

Tae Gyun gets an address for where the hacking originally occurred. It’s a location in Seoul. Hyuk Joo: “Let’s go then!” And the Cy-Team races to the address to hunt down the hackers!

The wiping program doesn’t go fast enough for Eung Jin’s liking, so he tells them to just throw the computers out the window. Just as the Cy-Team arrives at the building where the hackers are, they see a computer crash into a dozen pieces on the sidewalk. They look up, wondering where the computer came from. Realizing that the hackers already know they’re after them, the Cy-Team rushes up to the building.

It’s a race!

Comments:

Wow lots of things keep falling at the Cy-Team’s feet! I loved seeing the Cy-Team just band together and focus solely on getting the big bad, Hyun Min. Though I think Sang Woo and Tae Gyun may not know exactly why they’re chasing Hyun Min just yet, they do know that there is a greater evil orchestrating a lot of things around them. I wonder why Hye Ram wasn’t involved. Though she may not prove to be a very useful member to the Cy-Team, her absence still worries me because it makes me wonder if she were on Eung Jin’s side after all.

The ending of the episode made me feel like we just got into those classic action movies where the ragtag team finally get together and do a whole bunch of criminally wrong things for good. It’s like Italian Job + a whole lotta Hackers. I love that even though Woo-Young’s spearheading the whole initiative, it’s Hyuk Joo’s final approval that propels them forth. Hyuk Joo – the upright cop who hates anything to do with hacking – is the one promoting the use of it in order to get to the bottom of the case.

With 5 episodes to the end, clearly there’s going to be a very long and thoughtful battle as the tension increases between Hyun Min and Woo-Young. But it also means that there’s going to be a whole lot of lost evidence.

(Side note: Yeon Joo’s new hair cut? Not attractive…)

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