Ghost in the Machine

In a Cleveland, Ohio computer store, a serial killer named Karl Hochman, known as The Address Book Killer for his habit of stealing address books and choosing victims from them, steals the address book of a customer, Terry Munroe, Karen Allen, while the store manager uses the book to demonstrate a handheld scanner. He copies a page from her book into a computer, setting the stage for a chilling sequence of events.

On a rainy night, Karl speeds into an oncoming lane to avoid a truck, veering off the road into a cemetery while he laughs maniacally. In the emergency room, an MRI procedure is interrupted by a surge from an electrical storm, and Karl’s soul is transferred into a computer. As a network-based entity, he resumes his killings by exploiting devices connected to the electrical grid and computer networks.

Karl accesses the scanned page from Terry’s address book and begins to kill everyone listed there. The first victim is Frank Mallory, Richard McKenzie, his boss, whose kitchen is irradiated by a microwave oven. A friend, Elliot Miller, meets a fiery end when a hand dryer becomes a flamethrower. Later, babysitter Carol Maibaum, Shevonne Durkin, is hired to look after Terry’s son Josh Munroe and his best friend Frazer, Brandon Quintin Adams. Carol becomes the third victim when an exposed electrical cord on the kitchen floor electrocutes her as the dishwasher explodes and floods the room.

The police struggle to believe that Karl could still be active after his death, but Josh begins to notice that the order of the killings matches the order of the contacts in Terry’s address book. Terry teams up with Bram Walker, a noted computer hacker, Chris Mulkey, and together they start unplugging everything in Terry’s house to break the connection Karl has with the living world.

Meanwhile, anonymous reports pour in to the police about an armed robbery, a hostage situation, domestic violence, and a murder in progress at Terry’s house, prompting a siege. The officers, mistaking an exploding power pole for gunfire, open fire before realizing their mistake, and Terry’s mother is left in shock and rushed to the hospital.

With Bram and Josh’s help, Bram counters Karl’s digital assault by introducing a computer virus that traps the killer in a physics laboratory. They activate an atom smasher housed there, and Karl is drawn into its powerful magnetic field and destroyed.

In the final moment, Bram urges Terry to turn off a heart rate monitor in an ambulance, and the screen fades to black, leaving the fates of the surviving characters open to interpretation. The film blends a techno-thriller premise with a domestic siege, turning a remotely connected killer into a modern horror that operates at the speed of a network.

Last Updated: October 09, 2025 at 11:00