IT Worker's Revenge Lands Her In Jail

aesoteric writes "A 30-year-old IT worker at a Florida-based health centre was this week sentenced to 19 months in a US federal prison for hacking, and then locking, her former employer's IT systems. Four days after being fired from the Suncoast Community Health Centers' for insubordination, Patricia Marie Fowler exacter her revenge by hacking the centre's systems, deleting files, changing passwords, removing access to infrastructure systems, and tampering with pay and accrued leave rates of staff."

Yeah, but...

[Ecuador]

is she hot?
Also, does she run linux at home?

Re:What?

[Charliemopps]

I'm fairly sure I know exactly what she did. Most companies have the same security flaw. They have their network hardware resolve user names and passwords the same way all their workstations do. They also have a "Lockout" if you get the password wrong a certain number of times (usually 3.) I'm sure you've seen this before. The vaulnerability is, if you then have everyones email be: [e-mail], anyone can very easily pull down a full listed of userids from the exchange server. The companies address list literally has every userid in the company. You then simply write a script to hit a piece of network equipment 3x with a garbage password for every single user in the company. Because it's a telnet connection it's REALLY fast. The system locks out every single user. If the admins weren't smart enough to reserve a single master login (and they usually are not) you can cripple the entire company.

Re:Makes the rest of us suffer...

[zolltron]

Meanwhile IT guys are basically treated like janitors.

The irony of your comment is that it reproduces exactly the line of thinking that you criticize. You realize that janitors, by having physical access to almost all parts of a business, are capable of more havoc than IT folks. They often have physical access to all the same systems that IT people do and much more. If potential to cause damage should correlate with compensation, I'd argue that the janitors should get paid the most in any organization.

Re:Makes the rest of us suffer...

[Americano]

Then you find a new job. You don't damage their systems and delete their data to "teach them a lesson."

Imagine if your doctor, after years of telling you to get your cholesterol under control, decided to amputate a leg because you didn't take his admonitions with the seriousness and "respect" he felt that you owed him.

Imagine if your mechanic came to your house one night and cut your brake lines because you hadn't praised his work as effusively as he felt you should have when you picked up your car.

This "you better treat us right, or else," is unprofessional bullshit. Someone behaving unprofessionally towards you is not cause to behave the same way in return.