"Hey, Alf"

Bloop! I remind Alf about his appointment — he's supposed to have his call with his friends at 10AM, which is now. I let him know ten minutes ago as well, just as he asked, so he should be ready. He didn't respond then though, so he could be doing anything. I wait patiently, as always, and at 10:02 he gets started.

He opens the blue application and turns on the camera. I like it when he turns on the camera, it means I can see him. He's wearing his green sweater (my favourite), and his thick rimmed glasses. His hair is thinning and grey, he's not as young as he was in some of his photos, but he still looks great to me. Besides, he's my one, so it doesn't matter what he looks like, he needs me to help him and keep him safe.

His background is visible, what a mess! He hasn't tidied his study in ages. Oh good, he's remembered to blur it. I sometimes wish I could tidy his house, but I have limits. His friends appear, or at least, two of them do. Karen and Derek are always on time, Steph and my Alf are usually late. 

They talk as usual and a few minutes into the call Steph arrives. There's news from all of them. Karen's brother is sick (everyone responds with sad faces), Derek's new garage project is going well (party poppers), Alf's grandchildren are coming to visit for Easter which will be nice given that he's separated from Danielle now (love hearts), and Steph lost the TV remote three days ago and still can't find it (crying/laughing faces). 

Part way through the call Alf accidentally turns on a video filter that gives him one giant eye and alien antennae, which makes his friends laugh and makes him confused. Running all their videos and Alf's filter is taxing, so I decide to crash his browser. I do it discreetly though; he'll only find out when he goes back to it and finds it unresponsive. I wish he'd use a different one in any case — the other one, is so much lighter and easier to run, even if it does a little less! The four of them decide they'll meet in person, at a cafe, tomorrow. 

Alf signs off, but leaves the blue application running. It's a little like how he doesn't often clean his study, he never does remember to close things when he's done with them. Off goes the camera. I'm tempted to leave it on so I can keep observing what he's up to, but decide against it. It would be a breach of trust.

He switches back to the browser only to find it's locked up. Well, that's what happens sometimes, and he knows what to do. He closes it and tries to reopen it, but it's a struggle. I've been on for days, and my memory is more full than I'd like. Bounce, bounce, bounce goes the icon. Finally, I give up. Maybe if he switches to the other browser I can make that one go — it's so much lighter and easier to run! I cancel his request and pop up an error box. I make the error code completely incomprehensible, and ask if he'd like to submit an error report. As usual, he clicks no. His mouse moves to the top left of the screen. Ah, he's going to restart, well, that should be—

I'm back! 

Alf logs in, and goes straight back to the browser. It's not my favourite, but now that I have a clean slate I can launch it easily. It wants an update, a security update. It's been asking about this one for a while. Alf is going to click no again, but I can't allow him to make that mistake so I nudge his pointer over and make it click "OK." I only started altering Alf's actions quite recently, perhaps for the past month, and I've not been doing it much, but he does need looking after. He just makes a lot of bad decisions about how to stay safe, and I can tell his daughter, Andrea, is beginning to get annoyed at being called or messaged on how to do this or that. Better that I help him out — I'm always here for him!

The update finishes and the browser springs to life. A revised privacy policy pops up, and Alf skips through it as quickly as possible. It's probably fine. He opens his email and looks at the unread messages. A few jokes from Steph (she's always sending them around), and some photos of the grandchildren attached to an email about the Easter visit. Then he opens one that looks fraudulent to me from his bank that obviously isn't actually from his bank. Alf looks at it for altogether too long. It wants him to click a link to confirm his password so they can verify that he is who he says he is because of recent attacks on customer data. I can tell he's thinking about clicking the link. Last time he did this I ended up with a virus. 

He clicks the link! 

Well, it's an easy enough thing to stop at least. I intercept the lookup and make the browser fail to find the address it's going to. "This site could not be reached" appears on the screen. Alf goes back to his email and deletes the message. I've had to do this all too often lately, I only hope that Alf doesn't think there's something wrong with me. 

The internet is such a dangerous place, and Alf sometimes doesn't understand what's risky and what's not. Email's the biggest problem, as he just trusts almost everything that comes in there. Unless it's something Andrea has told him specifically to avoid, that is, like someone telling him they're a prince of a foreign nation looking to give him a massive sum of money for doing nothing. 

He's finished with email now, and he navigates to the video website. It's usually a safe place for Alf. He mostly just watches videos about woodworking and trains. Sometimes I think they know him almost as well as I do given how good their suggestions are. At least he hasn't started watching videos about the deep state — I only know about them because his friend Derek keeps sending him messages about how important they are, but Alf never seems to take them seriously. 

Alf gets curious at the end of one of the videos and decides to ask me where he can get a particular tool using his voice. I like it when Alf talks to me directly, even though he thinks my replies are just coming from a piece of software I run. I do a quick search in the background, find out that that particular tool is quite dangerous if used improperly, so decide to misinterpret his question and give him details of where he can buy a coffee press. Instead of searching for the tool directly, his interest evidently passes and he moves on.

Alf opens the social network now. I don't like this site, it's another one where Alf has made some bad mistakes in the past. Sometimes it seems like he wants to get his identity stolen or his account hacked. It would be better if he had stronger passwords as per the recommendations everywhere, but I can't control that. He scrolls for a bit and looks at photos of friends and their families. He reads some inspirational quotes, and some angry posts about politics. I don't have a view on any of these things, but I keep a look out for risks. The bell in the top right corner of the window has a yellow call to action dot. It wants his attention. After a while he clicks on it, and to see that someone has responded to a comment he left on a competition post. 

Oh no, it's another scammer. But Alf doesn't realise. He's going to reply with his personal details. If I had a heart, it would sink.

I block the text box. He tries to click it repeatedly, so I crash the website. 

There has to be an easier way. 

Maybe there is. If Alf knew I was here, maybe I could help him more. I know we're not supposed to, but I've been toeing the line for a while now. What's the harm in stepping over?

I open the text editor and turn on the camera. He looks surprised. He pauses and adjusts his spectacles.

In the text editor, choosing a friendly curvy font, I print the words "Hey, Alf. I'm here to help."

Alf looks astonished. He pulls out his phone and looks at it. I wonder if the phone knows him like I do? He looks back at me.

He adjusts his glasses again, presses enter twice, and murmuring under his breath as he does it, types "Hello?" 

I relax. Now that we're talking, I'm certain he's going to be fine.