Alex Jacobson

Alex Jacobson is the UNATCO communications tech, coordinating all of its security and cyberspace operations from UNATCO HQ on Liberty Island.

Background
Highly skilled and adept at his profession, Jacobson was specifically sought by UNATCO high-command to handle all of the team's IT requirements and to serve as its primary cyber-security officer charged with combating the threat of viral uploads, hacking, spying, and data theft. His occipital jack implant and custom-made hacker attire certainly help in his job.

Alex spends his entire work day talking to people: agents in the field, the folks in UNATCO's data division, civilian librarians and record-keepers, etc. An autodidact, Alex doesn't have a college degree, but honed his inherent computer talents by becoming a self-styled "hacker vigilante" in his late teen-age years. With methods the authorities could only envy, Alex ferreted out all sorts of on-line criminals and anonymously turned the evidence over to the police.

UNATCO eventually located him and made him an offer he couldn't (and wouldn't) refuse. He's been happily jacked in, supplied with an endless variety of free sugar, ever since. He enjoys feeling like he's on a team, fighting the good fight in the best way he can. In his spare time, he routinely corresponds with the Oracle, a nascent Internet AI, researching topics he comes across in his work such as the SH-187 or Majestic 12, and competes with other hackers from around the world, such as cRakS.

Personality
Alex has a casual and easy-going personality, and is apparently not overly interested in the administrative and political machinations of UNATCO's day-to-day operations. He also serves as field advisor to the augmented agents during combat operations, although this position is not actually official as of yet, due to the fact that augmentation technology is still undergoing field-testing.

Interactions
When JC first arrives at Liberty Island, Alex is tasked with supplying the rookie operative with all required information, geographical details, schematics, structural layouts, and enemy positioning details to assist him in the completion of his objectives. Jacobson communicates with Paul and JC via the "Infolink," a piece of augmentation technology capable of providing a direct internal link to the brain of an agent. Jacobson sees everything JC sees, and he hears everything JC hears. As a result, he is privy to all information made known to JC throughout his missions.

Over the course of the game, however, much like his colleague Jaime Reyes, Alex finds his loyalty to UNATCO tested by the behavior of its agents and leaders. Becoming severely disillusioned with his employer, Alex accepts JC's offer to join Tracer Tong in Hong Kong to help uncover the truth behind the Majestic 12 conspiracy. Tong then sends Alex to the residence of Morgan Everett, former head of the overthrown Illuminati, in an attempt to verify Everett's alleged intentions to assist the resistance's war with Majestic 12.

Quotes

 * "Like leading a mouse to cheese."
 * "You're certainly quicker on the up-take than your brother Paul ever was."
 * "They'll have you killed. They won't even blink an eye."

Trivia

 * Alex Jacobson's character model and name are based on Warren Spector's own nephew, Alec Jacobson.
 * Although not very likely, the character's surname and occupation could be a reference to Roman Jakobson, a renowned Russian-American linguist who developed the structural and analytical basis for communication theory, making a major breakthrough in linguistic science of the past century.