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posted by Fnord666 on Tuesday March 07 2017, @08:14AM   Printer-friendly
from the quis-custodiet-ipsos-custodes? dept.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

A sportswear company in Oregon has alleged that a senior IT manager left a backdoor in its systems before departing to a business partner and illegally used that access almost 700 times for his new employer's benefit.

In its complaint to a federal court in Oregon [PDF], Columbia Sportswear demanded a jury trial for Michael Leeper, who it alleged had illegally accessed highly confidential information to the benefit of a business parter, tech consulting firm Denali Advanced Integration, which Leeper had left to work for.

The accusation of betrayal notes that Leeper had been an employee at Columbia since May 2000, when he joined as manager of its desktop services team. He was subsequently promoted to senior director of technology infrastructure, from which he was responsible for maintaining Columbia's global IT systems and dealing with technology vendors including Denali, for which he departed the sportswear business in 2014.

Just a day before leaving, however, Leeper allegedly created a network account under the name "Jeff Manning", called "jmanning", which provided him with remote access to Columbia's network, including its VPN. Using this account, Leeper plundered Columbia nearly 700 times over the next two years, stealing corporate plans as well as information on its technology budget, all for the benefit of Denali as it competed for his former employer's cash.


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 07 2017, @01:23PM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 07 2017, @01:23PM (#475986)

    obviously it's pitiful that this person pilfered his ex employer but how dumb does the company have to be to not bother closing extra accounts and letting it happen for so long? At some point companies and governments have to be responsible for their own stupidity, laziness and ignorance. If you leave the backdoor wide open to your house do you then go hunt down the raccoon who tore up your trash? or do you clean up the mess and shut the damn door next time?

    • (Score: 2) by bob_super on Tuesday March 07 2017, @06:36PM

      by bob_super (1357) on Tuesday March 07 2017, @06:36PM (#476115)

      You cut costs, giving you no budget for a proper accounts & security audit when the IT leaves.
      Then you blame him for being an asshole, and see how many of your own mistakes and good competitor moves you can excuse under that convenient blanket.
      You may optionally blame his replacement and/or outsource now that you have an excuse.

      The buck stops there, and your bonus is direct deposit.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 07 2017, @02:15PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 07 2017, @02:15PM (#476015)

    Larcenous Leeper left but lept for lucre ...

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