6 ms·

‘Office Space’ movie gave Zulily engineer a blueprint for financial fraud

47 points by abixb 4y ago

GoToRO 4y ago
Did he lookup "money laundering" in a dictionary?
kylecazar 4y ago
Also probably just skimmed wallstreetbets, considering he put it all in GameStop. Not the most sophisticated of plans
granshaw 4y ago
…then proceeded to lose it all on GME options - can’t make this stuff up
- paulpauper 4y ago
  or so he alleges
gnabgib 4y ago
Posted so many times (9 so far).. the most active was 36pts, 13 comments[0]. Granted the fellow had a file called "OfficeSpace project", but in Office Space they're inspired by Superman (Inspired to be inspired from Office Space?) [0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34192427 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34192427
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
Arainach 4y ago
>Evidence against Valdez includes notes in which he referred to the plan as the “OfficeSpace project" Never take notes when planning crimes...
- pimpampum 4y ago
  Or use encryption!!! What a noob.
- baryphonic 4y ago
  He could have at least called it the Michael Bolton project
- ramesh31 4y ago
  >Never take notes when planning crimes... The guy was clearly not very bright. This isn't some criminal mastermind big brain stuff. Any random dev with prod access could trivially execute something similar. But anyone with a brain knows that you'll be caught immediately. There's simply too many checks in the financial system to pull it off.
- scottiebarnes 4y ago
  > Never take notes when planning crimes... Relevant 'The Wire' clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBdGOrcUEg8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBdGOrcUEg8
paulpauper 4y ago
He should have just done one of those Elon Musk crypto livestream things. Would have made more or equal $ with no risk. I dunno why people try to rip off big companies like this. The Risk vs. reward is terrible. All audited and everything traced closely.
- jjeaff 4y ago
  My guess is that it's the small to mid-sized businesses that end up being the easiest targets. Many don't have all the same record keeping or auditing practices. I've read about scammers just sending random invoices to small businesses and getting paid. Someone did this to the tube of millions to the likes of Facebook and Google, but I guess were eventually found out.
  - fbdab103 4y ago
    A report [0] on the Google/Facebook invoices. Such a simple idea, if they had stuck to a few $500k requests and stopped, they likely never would have been caught. As I recall (not in the linked story), one of the reasons one of the expenses was flagged was because the scammers invoiced a higher amount ($10million+) requiring additional approvals. [0] https://www.npr.org/2019/03/25/706715377/man-pleads-guilty-to-phishing-scheme-that-fleeced-facebook-google-of-100-million https://www.npr.org/2019/03/25/706715377/man-pleads-guilty-t... Edit: Fixed typo
karaterobot 4y ago
This Superman III erasure will not stand.
- neilv 4y ago
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7JBXGkBoFc&t=1m10s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7JBXGkBoFc&t=1m10s
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
mtmail 4y ago
Unlike in the Office Space movie it was more than just moving a few cents around. He employee ordered over 1000 items in a month (to resell?). That should ring any alarm bell already.
- jjeaff 4y ago
  It didn't ring alarm bells because people were aware that he was placing "test orders". They just weren't aware that he was not in fact cancelling said orders.
- qbrass 4y ago
  In the Office Space movie, a bug in the the software they uploaded caused it to steal much faster than it was supposed to. Which led to everyone involved panicking about getting caught. The stuff he ordered was part of a different thing than the 'Office Space' scam they also found. It was either an actual screw-up on his part, that he tried to cover up by reversing the charges, or a scam closer to the one a Microsoft employee tried to pull off a while back. https://www.ign.com/articles/microsoft-employee-steals-xbox-gift-cards-10-million https://www.ign.com/articles/microsoft-employee-steals-xbox-...
bitwize 4y ago
Well, it worked in Superman III...
malkia 4y ago
Probably this github account - https://github.com/castroev https://github.com/castroev
adamredwoods 4y ago
I enjoyed my time working at Zulily, the engineers are given a lot of responsibility, which can be good or bad, but I enjoyed it. Too bad GeekWire is using the old photo, the new logo looks better. I recognize the name of the alleged, we worked on separate teams. This should have been caught in code review, though. I have no comment to say other than that.
- deltree7 4y ago
  Can code review really catch this? If it is hidden under 20 levels of abstraction and obfuscation?
  - adamredwoods 4y ago
    In ecommerce we work with money in cents, as an integer. If he was catching pennies off FP rounding errors (as in OfficeSpace), then that is an easy red flag during code review. But the more I think about it, he may have gotten around a code review somehow and pushed to prod (speculation).
jmclnx 4y ago
These days, I believe it is very hard to steal fractions of pennies from transactions. Where I work, in some cases we calculate out to 3 decimals for USD due to customers "renting" services based upon various usages.
Teamteam16 4y ago
Spacestriker

47 points by abixb 4y ago

GoToRO 4y ago

Did he lookup "money laundering" in a dictionary?

kylecazar 4y ago

Also probably just skimmed wallstreetbets, considering he put it all in GameStop. Not the most sophisticated of plans

granshaw 4y ago

…then proceeded to lose it all on GME options - can’t make this stuff up

paulpauper 4y ago
or so he alleges

gnabgib 4y ago

Posted so many times (9 so far).. the most active was 36pts, 13 comments[0]. Granted the fellow had a file called "OfficeSpace project", but in Office Space they're inspired by Superman (Inspired to be inspired from Office Space?) [0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34192427 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34192427

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

Arainach 4y ago

>Evidence against Valdez includes notes in which he referred to the plan as the “OfficeSpace project" Never take notes when planning crimes...

pimpampum 4y ago
Or use encryption!!! What a noob.
baryphonic 4y ago
He could have at least called it the Michael Bolton project
ramesh31 4y ago
>Never take notes when planning crimes... The guy was clearly not very bright. This isn't some criminal mastermind big brain stuff. Any random dev with prod access could trivially execute something similar. But anyone with a brain knows that you'll be caught immediately. There's simply too many checks in the financial system to pull it off.
scottiebarnes 4y ago
> Never take notes when planning crimes... Relevant 'The Wire' clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBdGOrcUEg8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBdGOrcUEg8

paulpauper 4y ago

He should have just done one of those Elon Musk crypto livestream things. Would have made more or equal $ with no risk. I dunno why people try to rip off big companies like this. The Risk vs. reward is terrible. All audited and everything traced closely.

jjeaff 4y ago
My guess is that it's the small to mid-sized businesses that end up being the easiest targets. Many don't have all the same record keeping or auditing practices. I've read about scammers just sending random invoices to small businesses and getting paid. Someone did this to the tube of millions to the likes of Facebook and Google, but I guess were eventually found out.
- fbdab103 4y ago
  A report [0] on the Google/Facebook invoices. Such a simple idea, if they had stuck to a few $500k requests and stopped, they likely never would have been caught. As I recall (not in the linked story), one of the reasons one of the expenses was flagged was because the scammers invoiced a higher amount ($10million+) requiring additional approvals. [0] https://www.npr.org/2019/03/25/706715377/man-pleads-guilty-to-phishing-scheme-that-fleeced-facebook-google-of-100-million https://www.npr.org/2019/03/25/706715377/man-pleads-guilty-t... Edit: Fixed typo

karaterobot 4y ago

This Superman III erasure will not stand.

neilv 4y ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7JBXGkBoFc&t=1m10s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7JBXGkBoFc&t=1m10s

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

mtmail 4y ago

Unlike in the Office Space movie it was more than just moving a few cents around. He employee ordered over 1000 items in a month (to resell?). That should ring any alarm bell already.

jjeaff 4y ago
It didn't ring alarm bells because people were aware that he was placing "test orders". They just weren't aware that he was not in fact cancelling said orders.
qbrass 4y ago
In the Office Space movie, a bug in the the software they uploaded caused it to steal much faster than it was supposed to. Which led to everyone involved panicking about getting caught. The stuff he ordered was part of a different thing than the 'Office Space' scam they also found. It was either an actual screw-up on his part, that he tried to cover up by reversing the charges, or a scam closer to the one a Microsoft employee tried to pull off a while back. https://www.ign.com/articles/microsoft-employee-steals-xbox-gift-cards-10-million https://www.ign.com/articles/microsoft-employee-steals-xbox-...

bitwize 4y ago

Well, it worked in Superman III...

malkia 4y ago

Probably this github account - https://github.com/castroev https://github.com/castroev

adamredwoods 4y ago

I enjoyed my time working at Zulily, the engineers are given a lot of responsibility, which can be good or bad, but I enjoyed it. Too bad GeekWire is using the old photo, the new logo looks better. I recognize the name of the alleged, we worked on separate teams. This should have been caught in code review, though. I have no comment to say other than that.

deltree7 4y ago
Can code review really catch this? If it is hidden under 20 levels of abstraction and obfuscation?
- adamredwoods 4y ago
  In ecommerce we work with money in cents, as an integer. If he was catching pennies off FP rounding errors (as in OfficeSpace), then that is an easy red flag during code review. But the more I think about it, he may have gotten around a code review somehow and pushed to prod (speculation).

jmclnx 4y ago

These days, I believe it is very hard to steal fractions of pennies from transactions. Where I work, in some cases we calculate out to 3 decimals for USD due to customers "renting" services based upon various usages.

Teamteam16 4y ago

Spacestriker