Signal Lost: The Zero Day Reckoning
Summary
When catastrophic cyberattacks paralyze America’s railways, two dismissed whistleblowers and an embattled government insider must outmaneuver denial, chaos, and their own demons to unmask a hidden enemy before the nation grinds to a halt.
In a near-future America, the sprawling rail network—kept alive by decades-old control systems—becomes ground zero for a chilling new wave of cyberattacks. Neil Smythe, a battle-scarred whistleblower haunted by past failures, and his irrepressible partner Eric Reuther, a social engineer with hacker roots, have long warned of a catastrophic flaw in the nation’s train braking systems. Their alarms fell on deaf ears, drowned out by the powerful American Rail Consortium (ARC), whose lobbyists mask self-preservation as prudence. But when simultaneous, inexplicable brake failures derail both a Los Angeles commuter train and a Midwest chemical freight, panic shreds the illusion of safety. As union crews strike, copycat hackers exploit the chaos, and the government teeters on the brink of suspending rail traffic, Smythe and Reuther are thrust from obscurity into the heart of a crisis they alone predicted.
With public trust eroding and conspiracy theories swirling, the duo joins forces with Chris Butero, a pragmatic CISA official torn between bureaucracy and duty. Together, they must navigate a labyrinth of media manipulation, industry denial, and their own haunted pasts to expose the true mastermind behind the attacks. But every step forward threatens to unleash further chaos, as a rogue hacktivist group blurs the line between whistleblowing and sabotage. Racing against institutional inertia and the ticking clock of national collapse, Smythe and Reuther must prove that conviction and expertise can still drive real change—before the ghosts of complacency doom America’s industrial backbone forever.
Inspired by: Hackers Can Tamper with Train Brakes Using Just a Radio, Feds Warn - https://gizmodo.com/hackers-can-tamper-with-train-breaks-using-just-a-radio-feds-warn-2000629522