3 ms·

Unless “they” were one or two disgruntled employees with the access, know-how, and motive to execute a “mistake”. Emphasis added.

bawolff 5y ago
If it was intentional, that's serious jail time territory. That's a high price to pay for such limited downtime. I'm pretty sure an intentionally malicious actor with that type of access could do much worse things.
- cheschire 5y ago
  I’m pretty sure the vast majority of entry level spy craft is about convincing people to do highly illegal and destructive things from a place of fear. Not saying this is the work of spies, just that it’s not unimaginable to think some middle manager could convince themselves or a subordinate to do something drastically illegal out of some fear that terrible things would happen otherwise.
- xkeysc0re 5y ago
  I'm curious as to what law, exactly, they would be breaking. Sabotage in the US code is defined mostly in terms of war material and damages done to physical "national defense" properties. Certainly an employee would be fired and sued by the company, but is deliberately changing a routing policy (and not something like a worm or virus that deletes or otherwise degrades hardware and software) a crime?
  - bawolff 5y ago
    IANAL but I would assume computer fraud and abuse act: (5)(a)knowingly causes the transmission of a program, information, code, or command, and as a result of such conduct, intentionally causes damage without authorization, to a protected computer;
    - xkeysc0re 5y ago
      In the cases cited under the CFAA (such as https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=12454527986200733388 https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=124545279862007...) it seems the employee deleted data and private info. In this case, no data was deleted or other computing property damaged it just became unreachable.
    - ironlion624 5y ago
      That’s the one.
    - pwdisswordfish0 5y ago
      The recent Van Buren decision would make that unlikely. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27389500 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27389500
  - ironlion624 5y ago
    Proof of intent is a significant burden placed upon prosecution. If that can be overcome, there’s legal precedent for criminal conviction namely under the CFAA. https://tadlaw.com/can-charged-crime-sabotaging-employers-computer/ https://tadlaw.com/can-charged-crime-sabotaging-employers-co...

bawolff 5y ago

If it was intentional, that's serious jail time territory. That's a high price to pay for such limited downtime. I'm pretty sure an intentionally malicious actor with that type of access could do much worse things.

cheschire 5y ago
I’m pretty sure the vast majority of entry level spy craft is about convincing people to do highly illegal and destructive things from a place of fear. Not saying this is the work of spies, just that it’s not unimaginable to think some middle manager could convince themselves or a subordinate to do something drastically illegal out of some fear that terrible things would happen otherwise.
xkeysc0re 5y ago
I'm curious as to what law, exactly, they would be breaking. Sabotage in the US code is defined mostly in terms of war material and damages done to physical "national defense" properties. Certainly an employee would be fired and sued by the company, but is deliberately changing a routing policy (and not something like a worm or virus that deletes or otherwise degrades hardware and software) a crime?
- bawolff 5y ago
  IANAL but I would assume computer fraud and abuse act: (5)(a)knowingly causes the transmission of a program, information, code, or command, and as a result of such conduct, intentionally causes damage without authorization, to a protected computer;
  - xkeysc0re 5y ago
    In the cases cited under the CFAA (such as https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=12454527986200733388 https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=124545279862007...) it seems the employee deleted data and private info. In this case, no data was deleted or other computing property damaged it just became unreachable.
  - ironlion624 5y ago
    That’s the one.
  - pwdisswordfish0 5y ago
    The recent Van Buren decision would make that unlikely. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27389500 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27389500
- ironlion624 5y ago
  Proof of intent is a significant burden placed upon prosecution. If that can be overcome, there’s legal precedent for criminal conviction namely under the CFAA. https://tadlaw.com/can-charged-crime-sabotaging-employers-computer/ https://tadlaw.com/can-charged-crime-sabotaging-employers-co...