A different viewpoint on Snowden

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I was reading this article
http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygree...mong-geniuses/
Which led me to this website. Very interesting stuff.
https://www.eff.org/

[JV_]

I wish more people who worked at the NSA carried a pocket constitution.

[SeriousStudent]

It's an interesting Forbes article. I knew Snowden had done some Sharepoint work for them. I was not aware that he'd been given his manager's account and password though.

That is grounds for immediate termination in my organization. The employee and the boss, and anyone that knows about it and who does not report it is immediately walked out the door.

[TheTrevor]

Security violations aside, note that it is NOT alleged that Snowden did anything unauthorized with his manager's credentials. I think that says something about his character.

[LHS]

It's an interesting Forbes article. I knew Snowden had done some Sharepoint work for them. I was not aware that he'd been given his manager's account and password though.

That is grounds for immediate termination in my organization. The employee and the boss, and anyone that knows about it and who does not report it is immediately walked out the door.

Yep, that's a big no-no, even in the corporate world. SOX auditors have a conniption fit if they find out about such things. At a previous job, I had to deal with a moron who was denied access to a DB, then got his boss' login and proceeded to crash the data mart with what, to this day, is still the single worst SQL query I've ever seen. There wasn't any malice involved, just a level of idiocy that rose to the sublime. Seriously, there were seven whole pages of Cartesian joins. I had to google the name of the number range that came after a quadrillion in order to quantify the plan costs. It's "pentillion", for the record. I gave a printed copy to the guy's boss. I should have had it framed.

[SeriousStudent]

Security violations aside, note that it is NOT alleged that Snowden did anything unauthorized with his manager's credentials. I think that says something about his character.

Understood. I have very, very mixed feelings about him and his actions.

As an IT geek with the highest possible access inside my organization, I have only two things to offer. My skill set, and trust. If my company does not trust me, they have to immediately remove my access. I've helped write the procedures on exactly how to do that, for the very few people with my access rights.

At the same time, a lot of the things that he revealed have frankly infuriated me. Was it done for the greater good? If so, exactly how much of his data is in the hands of the FSB now? Could it have been done differently? Or considering the NSA's reach, was that his only option?

I just don't know. I think about it a lot. But I can't make up my mind what he is.

[SeriousStudent]

Yep, that's a big no-no, even in the corporate world. SOX auditors have a conniption fit if they find out about such things. At a previous job, I had to deal with a moron who was denied access to a DB, then got his boss' login and proceeded to crash the data mart with what, to this day, is still the single worst SQL query I've ever seen. There wasn't any malice involved, just a level of idiocy that rose to the sublime. Seriously, there were seven whole pages of Cartesian joins. I had to google the name of the number range that came after a quadrillion in order to quantify the plan costs. It's "pentillion", for the record. I gave a printed copy to the guy's boss. I should have had it framed.

Agreed, and we deal with more auditors than just SOX.

I may know a guy that got dragged into a war room to help troubleshoot an issue that had crashed an entire e-commerce website for a Fortune 100 company. When a particularly surly VP asked him if he knew why he'd been called in, he responded:

"Because I have oppose-able thumbs?"

Yeah, that guy has not been promoted in a while, but still has his job. The VP is gone, though.

[TheTrevor]

You folks are killing me. This has somehow diverged into a conversation that is so familiar, it's like slipping on a well-worn bathrobe. I enjoy shooting sports as a counterbalance to my life of abstract geekery, and now you're crossing the streams...

[RoyGBiv]

Security violations aside, note that it is NOT alleged that Snowden did anything unauthorized with his manager's credentials. I think that says something about his character.

Maybe it just says he was smart enough not to abuse that access because it could so easily be traced back to him?
Or maybe he DID abuse that access in some way that has yet to be discovered.

[SeriousStudent]

Maybe it just says he was smart enough not to abuse that access because it could so easily be traced back to him?
Or maybe he DID abuse that access in some way that has yet to be discovered.

Agree with Mr Biv. It's why we are so tough on that behavior. it's a lot easier to prevent the cat from getting out of the bag, than it is to count every footprint after it escapes.