Webspace

In the not-too-distant future, the exponential rate of computer and software development has reached staggering proportions. Nowhere is this more evident than the internet. With the advent of 100 megabyte data transfer rates, and CyberSystems Incorporated websuit technology, virtual reality has become alternate reality.

Equipped with a websuit and a data terminal, users can meet in 3-D cyberspace. They can touch, and feel, everything. Complex safety systems exist to ensure that no harm can come to users on the ’net, or so it is generally believed.

More and more, alternate reality is used for business and pleasure. There is no longer any requirement for travel; with almost all major business conducted on the web, commuter traffic is almost a thing of the past. And why pay through the nose for a foreign holiday, when at the flick of a switch you can visit any luxury resort without leaving the comfort of your own home?

But the advent of near-perfect physical representation in webspace brought with it social and legal problems on an unprecedented scale. Officer Mack901, together with his colleagues working for the Central Net Server Agency, is charged with policing the web, ensuring that people are who they say they are. Armed with formidable software, he is able to go where ordinary users cannot, and with software stealth technology he spends his working life hunting down hackers and fraudulent registrations.

But there is more to webspace than meets the eye. A secret society, The Doomwatch Group, have been silently monitoring internet activity since its inception in the 1960s. When Mack901 begins investigating allegations of Physical Violations on the web, he is contacted by the mysterious group of anonymous watchers. Physical Violations, in spite of all software and hardware safety measures, are real.

Soon Mack is drawn into a surreal but nevertheless life-threatening nightmare, both in the real world and in alternate reality.