Is it Just Me, Or Is Our Mainframe Missing?

xnuandax writes "Here's a salient lesson for those system security personnel who spend their time fretting over the theoretical crack-ability of their 1024 bit encryption keys. Australian Customs have recently suffered a rather unfortunate set back in their "War Against Terror" with the admission that two of their secure mainframe servers have been wheeled out of the building by persons unknown. I'll bet my $2 that the root password on those boxes was 'trustno1'."

Comments

My IT team did that once.

[paganizer]

My last contract at a bank we did that; I won't mention the city, but the bank owned the buildings all around it and used them for storage. We had a bunch of contractors coming in for a workstation rollout, and the first day on the job I had them wander around the building, without ID of any kind, and just grab random computers and haul them across the street, using whatever explanation for it they felt like.

it was the NEXT DAY before any inquiries came in.

Oh, they also used the signs on the buildings you could see through the windows as admin passwords.

How is this unusual?

[bertok]

I can relate to this with personal experience. One of my first IT contracting jobs was a two week Windows 2000 rollout at a 110 user company. My job was to pick up every desktop one by one, take it up to the IT cubicle, Ghost six of them at a time, then return the computers. I liased exlusively with the sole IT administrator there.

It was only on the second last day that someone questioned my actions. Until then, nobody thought twice about an unfamiliar person sauntering up their desk, unplugging their desktop PC, and walking off. Because the old PCs were so dusty, I wasn't even wearing my normal business attire -- instead, I was wearing jeans and a t-shirt.

This is by no means unusual. I've been to places where the IT employees did not know which servers do what, how many servers they actually have, or what the passwords are. In a place like that, a missing server may not be noticed for days!

Re:This is what happens ...

[JWSmythe]

US Federal law says that staff who earn part of their wages from tips must be paid at least $2.13/hr.

Many restraunts do that. You work, you get $2.25/hr (or whatever the boss is nice enough to pay you). So in most places, the staff are very dependant on your tips.

I tip 20%, and then adjust by service. If the service seriously sucked ass, you may get nothing. If you were really good, you may get 20% rounded up to the nearest $10. ($85 dollar meal would get a $20 tip). Knowing most people are complete idiots who don't tip for good service, it's worth it for me for two reasons. 1) they deserve decent pay if they did a good job. 2) I expect good service next time I come in, and will probably get it. Usually if I tip well and come back another day, I get better than average service. Places I go regularly, I don't have to ask for my drink, they'll have it ready by the time I'm seated.

But, tipping doesn't excuse impoliteness. Well, you probably wouldn't get a tip if you're looking at all your customers saying "What kind of idiot....", but the polite waiter gets pleases and thank you's, and a good tip.

But in some parts of the world, this isn't expected or acceptable. I gave a taxi driver in Europe a $10 tip for getting me from point A to point B in no time. He was polite, held the door for me, yada, yada, yada. He was completely flabergasted that I gave him anything extra.

In New York, I gave a taxi driver $20 for getting me from Times Square to the WTC in less than 5 minutes. Of course, stop lights and lane markings are frequently meaningless, so that helped accomplish the time. :) It saved my ass though, I had to be in like 3 places at once, and got everything accomplished on a very short timetable.

In some US cities, you may be lucky the car doesn't hit you driving away if you don't tip.

Flight attendants don't take tips, and get offended when you offer one. I haven't quite figured that one out yet. If I buy a beer from a fight attendant, they are the bartender, and the bartender always get tipped.

So, maybe in the UK you don't take tips, fine. In some countries it's most of the money that they make. In some jobs it's the majority of their paycheck.

I don't tip because I have extra money. I tip because I've worked just about every shit job there is at some point in time, and can completely relate to them having to deal with asshole customers every day who think that $2.25/hr actually pays the rent in most metro areas.

Re:This is what happens ...

[TGK]

My experiances traveling in Toyko paralell this. I've worked as a waiter in the United States and am quite familiar with the $2.13 per hour rule. Tips are a vital part of the salary. Tipping in those situations is not only appropriate but expected. Fundamentaly, waiters can't make a living at their jobs without it.

In Japan, however, things are a little different. Japanese custom considers a gift of money to a stranger (so basicly tipping) to be the rough equivilent of giving money to a begger on the street. Thus the waiter who accepts a tip is implicitly stating that he does not make enough/have enough to support himself and his family. (The Japanese are very focused on the implicit meanings of things) This is an afront to dignity, pride, and honor. Tipping in Japan is not only unexpected, it's RUDE.

I honestly didn't belive the tour book when I read this. However a very polite and kind waitress in a sushi bar explained this to me while I was reeling from the 16 hours of jet lag.