This is currently a small section more devoted to program ideas than actual game stat lists. The main reason for this is that I no longer use the Cyberpunk 2020 rules. R. Talsorian's rules are very good and I whole heartedly recommend them to any players who want a simple system that is easy to learn and very realistic. I had even managed to adapt a set of Star Wars' rules to Interlock(TM) before I decided to create my own rules based on percentile rolls and a variable success system (I am currently about 1/2 way through).
For this reason I have stuck mainly to concepts as opposed to rules. Something anyone who has read this page will be able to determine.
One of the more annoying aspects of the Net in CP 2020 is the ease of finding things. Be it data or datafortress. Everyone seems to know where everything is and things like data transfers are obvious and somewhat rare occurrences. The main problem of course with this, is scale. CP 2020's rules are fine if the net is a limited access club with very few members. Is this likely? I don't think so. The Net is home to every computer user in the world. Billions of users in hundreds of countries with every form of interface known to man, from agent programs to directly wired mind to machine links. Every computer, every service will have its own Netspace, a place where users can come and visit. I mean would today's web page makers turn down the opportunity to make use of 2020's virtual reality command language (at the lower levels this is cheap enough for even the middle class family to own)? I don't think so. So we have a Net that is crowded to the extreme (fortunately cyberspace is only limited by the number of computers hooked up, and that grows daily). Hundreds of thousands of Net sites (if not millions or billions) with an equally great number of users are floating out in the serene silence of netspace (unless of course you have the new streaming music plug in for your cybermodem). Moving at the speed of light (not really the human brain isn't efficient enough to actually do this, but movement and control in the net is significantly faster than in real life, no messy muscles and nerves to get in the way).
In this teeming mess (or is that mass) of cyberhumanity how in the hell do you find things? Well a few things stay the same, each bundle of data carrying fiber optic cable has a representation in the Net. The cable looks like a bar of light and is joined into a rough city like grid. Of course upon closer inspection things are not quite what they appear. Try it. Look closely at the data line, try to avoid examining the phone and video bandwidths as you will need special software to translate what they are carrying. As you gain a more detailed perspective you will find that the solid bar of light is in fact made up of millions of streams of light that simply blend together to give the appearance of solidity. You see each band is actually composed of a variable number of fiber optic lines in the real world and each fiber optic line can carry a few hundred thousand discrete streams of data. So how do you find anything in this mess? Well finding a known location takes no effort at all, your modem simply transmits you by any route you choose (after all this still works like a phone or web set up, each site has a specific address and each area is governed by a code). But finding data is a harder task. CP 2020 would make it seem like data can be followed with ease and once you've found it to a degree it can be. But finding it is the hard part. First you need a very fast scanning program that can label the data transmissions. If you are lucky you will find a corporation that has a dedicated transmissions channel (that is a channel that is restricted to their use and is always used), once you know the channel you can follow the data streams to their end points. Legitimate corporations and the more public side of the larger corporations use dedicated lines. However many corporations undertake illegal research or covert operations and they will need to have computer support for them as well. Black systems can be hidden so finding their netspace coordinates can be very difficult. They also scramble their data transmissions making them hard to label, and finally they randomize their data channels to make it very hard to follow data.
So what we have here is a system that makes it almost impossible to just find a piece of important data. But all is not impossible. Tracing programs can be used to look at a data stream to find and tag anything interesting. Once found the data can be followed to its destination (public data will have both destination and source addresses listed). In most cases this will lead the player to a lower level computer system, usually the public netsite. Now the netrunning can begin. Unlike CP 2020 where you tackle Arasaka directly and try to beat their ICE you have to begin at the bottom. Most computers will be hierarchical. That is each lower system will have limited access to a higher system with more features but at a greater level of security. The public access system will link up to the local system which might then link up to divisional computers and so on and so forth. Eventually the 'runner is going to find a link to a "deniable" system or the address for one. In addition this is also the best way to get in and out of a system. The 'runner cracks the lower level system and then gets to the second level where he writes a pass code for the first. No longer does he need to beat the first level to try take the second (this is based on the premise that pass codes are monitored from a more restricted system, why make a security system where a level one access code will allow a user to create another level one access code, instead you need a level 2. With these codes the 'runner can come back again and again to try for the system (if he made enough of them that is).
This program functions somewhat differently than normal code breaker programs. Produced by Enigma Tek the blabbermouth is added to the program listing of a datafortress after it has been raided. The netrunner is required to hide the program somewhere in the system. Blabbermouth then proceeds to create a new access identity for the netrunner. The next time he tries to run the fortress he begins with an automatic access port and no longer needs to fight his way in. Blabbermouth is slightly intelligent, when detected it will attempts to hide by copying itself into different sectors. If finally trapped the program will begin to produce millions of pass codes fouling up the system until all pass codes have been restored or until the virus runs out of memory space to fill.
This is a new program recently developed to counter the Blabbermouth backdoor system. When run this program safely eliminates the blabbermouth program but does nothing to remove the previously created access codes. As both programs are in their test phases there is no direct STR to STR test, zipper if used will always shut down the blabbermouth. It should be noted that zipper has no icon and blabbermouth tends to appear as part of the scenery.
Double the life span of your software with Enigma Tek's New MUTATOR software modification package. As you know all netrunning software gradually loses its effectiveness. As each new program is encountered and analyzed a new defense is created to stop it. But the key to defense is being able to identify you opponent. That is what Mutator is for. Mutator scrambles the recognition code of your software rendering the enemy's systems incapable of being able to rapidly identify it and mount an appropriate response. There is of course limit to all good things and Mutator is no exception, there are only so many ways to scramble code without rendering it useless. For the purposes of the game Mutator slows the reduction of software strength, twice as much time must pass before the program is reduced in effectiveness. Mutator is a hardware package, it looks very much like an old VCR tape rewinder. The user places a software chip into the machine and after 10 minutes (for each level of the program's strength) a scrambled version is produced on a blank chip. It should be noted that Enigma Tek makes no guarantees about the effectiveness of scrambled software and advises that Mutator be used at the user's own risk.
Ever been plagued by hound programs? Well now you need never fear again. Enigma Tek introduces the Dogpound peripheral for you home computer or cybermodem. The Dogpound is a specially designed containment unit designed to trap hounds. The user simply attaches the unit between the modem/computer and the net (that is it goes on the phone cable). The speed of all actions is reduced by 2 when the pound is being used. The 'runner simply lures a hound back to his system, and passes through the pound. The hound program follows (it will not go in to hiding unless the 'runner logs off). Once in the pound (actually a secondary buffer memory prior to the main system, I mention this as all CP 2020 programs should have some basis in reality, Killers are viruses etc... Many of the programs I have found from CP and on the present day net are fanciful and have no real basis in even sci-fi programming.) the hound is trapped, all links to outside systems are dropped and the memory is purged. No more hound. For game purposes the player must make a difficult programming roll to trap the hound.
Running scared. Netwatch on your ass. Enigma Tek can help. Caboose is a propagation based decoy program. Trigger the caboose and it immediately copies itself into the closest available memory block (the block closest to the address the 'runner Icon is at, not his deck or home systems). Once there is replicates itself, sending the copy to the next memory block it can find in the next system. The original then transmits a copy of the 'runner's net signature and then deletes itself. The copy then repeats the process. Assuming the trace was fooled (very difficulty interface roll) the trace will try to track the caboose through each new system. (The reason for the propagation copy is simple. No independent programs can float about in the Net, it's not possible. They have to be running somewhere. Hounds don't float about, they trace the 'runner while running at the datafortress and then copy themselves into a public memory area near the 'runner's last known access point. If the hound didn't make a copy the original in the datafortress would be useless until terminated or successful.)
Perhaps it's just me but I can't remember anything about compression software in use in CP 2020. For simplicity's sake any piece of data be it text file or virus program can be compressed. The software is simple and commonly available. Compression takes 1 turn per MU of data in the original file and when completed allows the Netrunner to store the file as a 1/2 normal MU file. The process takes just as long to reverse.