Change Control Management

This month's topic is about what can happen if your organization does not have a Change Control Management plan in place. This e-newsletter was based on an article that was taken out of the San Francisco Chronicle.

A disgruntled systems administrator is accused of sabotaging the city of San Francisco's multimillion-dollar computer system, which stores city records such as emails, payroll files, and law enforcement documents. Terry Childs, 43, of Pittsburg, Calif., was being held Tuesday on $5 million bail. The computer network administrator has been charged with four counts of computer tampering, the San Francisco Chronicle reported. Childs, who works in the city Department of Technology, allegedly created a password that gave him exclusive access to the city's new FiberWAN network, authorities told the newspaper. He has refused to divulge the password, leaving other system administrators locked out. Undoing Childs' alleged tampering could cost millions of dollars, city officials said. In the meantime, the system is operating, even though administrators have limited or no access. Childs, who has worked for the city for about five years, had been disciplined in recent months for poor job performance, and supervisors had tried to fire him, the newspaper reported.

"They weren't able to do it, and this was his kind of his insurance policy," an official who spoke on the condition of anonymity told the newspaper. Childs allegedly began tampering with the computer system June 20, building a tracing system to monitor what other administrators were saying or doing about his personnel case. Following Childs' arrest, authorities searched his home and car, fearing that he may have arranged for a third party to access the system by telephone or other electronic device to destroy sensitive city documents, the Chronicle said. No such device or evidence of such an arrangement was found. Childs' base pay in 2007 was $126,735. He earned an additional $22,534 for being on-call as a troubleshooter, the newspaper said. Security officials often warn organizations that employees are at least as big a threat to computer systems as outside hackers. Nevertheless, the 2008 Information Week Strategic Security Study found that 21% of the companies that responded, never conduct security risk assessments and of those that do, just one in five impose the rigor of using a specialized external auditor.

There you have it. This is precisely why an organization must implement a very detailed and accurate Change Control Management Plan. The term for this kind of behavior is "hero mentality", and this person has taken it to the extreme. A sound plan will have cross training as well as knowledge transfer built into the job descriptions for systems or network administrators. From a standpoint of risk management, this is a level of risk that should not and cannot be accepted by an organization.

To view more articles:

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or to inquire about an on-site presentation, please feel free to call me at 508-995-4933 or email me at mdesrosiers@m3ipinc.com.

Until next time.....

Regards,

Michael Desrosiers
Founder & Principal Consultant
m3ip, Inc.
Managing Your Security and Risk Needs
(O)508.995.4933
(C)774.644.0599
(F)508.995.4933
mdesrosiers@m3ipinc.com
http://www.m3ipinc.com

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