Re: Topics for CIO discussion?

On Feb 29, 2008, at 5:18 AM, John Young wrote:

> I worked on a multi-billion dollar infrastructure for which every
> single sheet, drawing, spec, letter were stamped with a disclaimer
> aimed at anybody who got a piece of the paper mountain after
> signing an NDA.
>
> Meanwhile the computer networks on which the documents were
> made available lacked rudimentary security, no control over those
> who got access, employee turnover heavy, available over the
> Internet.

Twenty-some years ago, when dialup was how one got into "online"  
computers, a major US military database had a login of Anonymous and  
a password of "LETMEIN".  Their security depended on the Bad Guys not  
knowing the modems' phone number.

Six years ago the (NT) server password at every office of a national  
US insurance company was - you guessed it - Admin.

In 1997, an extremely large, privately-held company in South Texas  
had its MIS Guy transfer a good bit of money to an account in Costa  
Rica just before he didn't come back from vacation.  They were  
frantic, because they had no idea what the admin password was for  
their Oracle installation.

It was ORACLE.

These are all instances of which I have personal, first-hand knowledge.

D


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