According to various sources, including the San Francisco Chronicle, a soon-to-be former network admin has locked everyon out of the San Francisco "FiberWAN" network. From the article, "records such as officials' e-mails, city payroll files, confidential law enforcement documents and jail inmates' bookings" are stored on this network. Terry Childs is currently in jail on $5 million bail.

He's apparently holding it hostage but as yet hasn't asked for anything in exchange for reenabling access to the network. I know it's cliche to say most criminals are not the brightest minds, but this takes the cake. I don't see any potential "win" for Childs out of this situation. Then again holding a network hostage in this manner is about as cliche as it gets for dumb ideas in the IT world. According to the news stories Childs was recently disciplined for poor job performance and almost fired. It makes sense that this is some sort of child-like (pun intended) retaliation. He gave law enforcement multiple incorrect passwords; how much time exactly did he think that would buy him?

Luckily Mayor Gavin Newsome said he is"confident that (the Department of Technology) is doing everything necessary to maintain the integrity of the city's computer networks." Great! Now I feel better. /sarcasm

Thanks to Robert Long for forwarding me the initial info/link for this post and with it a little morning amusement.

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