It's the first computer hacking case prosecuted in the city of Baltimore, and it's revenge gone wrong--at least for one former IT guy, Walter Powell. The former Baltimore Substance Abuse Systems employee pled guilty to switching out a lewd image in a former boss' Power Point presentation. Board members got porn not graphs.
The IT man, 52-year-old Walter Powell who was formerly in charge of technical at Baltimore Substance Abuse System Inc, probably shouldn't have alerted cops through a porn prank that prompted a search of his home for hacking evidence -- 'cause kind of led to find some guns and other things at the residence.
The IT man's road to hell began less than two years ago when he was fired from BSAS and, really, in December 2009 when he got himself in hot water over charges of network hacking. Powell's accused of spending over a month, 32 days, logged into BSAS's computer system well after he was fired -- accessing the network via an employee password that had (inexplicably) never been changed after the employee firing.
A password change should've been standard procedure. After company departure of any employee – who leaves at will or is fired – should be among the first things prioritized by any company. For whatever reason, it didn’t happen.
So, since the company ignored the concept of changing the former employee's password which would have effectively barred him from accessing its network, the IT man took full advantage: Using his existing password, the former employee installed basic keylogging software -- which allowed him to access the company’s network info and easily steal passwords belonging to current employees. Over one month Walter Powell accessed, or attempted to access, the BSAS network more than 100 times using the passwords of employees – an average of more than three times per day.
Walter Powell checked into at least five company e-mail accounts assigned to individual employees -- and decided to play around a bit, choosing and picking which emails to forward to other employees from other employees’ accounts. That in itself may have changed co-worker relationships.
Then choosing to kick things up a notch, the former IT man decided to switch identities for a day: He apparently had some fun, posing as the BSAS company's CEO, Greg Warren -- while creating a fake email he sent from Warren's account and then delivered to the entire company distribution list.
Powell's biggest accomplishment (and that may be in life) involved a Power Point Presentation: As 12 board members of a Baltimore substance abuse center gathered in a conference room to watch the Power Point presentation given by the CEO, the computer shut down and restarted – to provide a slide of a naked woman being displayed on a 64-inch screen. Board members present included city officials and foundation heads, from a board chaired by Baltimore's health commissioner.
The Baltimore City Police Department’s Cyber and Electronic Crimes Unit was less than pleased but, ironically, Powell's hijacking of the Power Point presentation with porn may have actually provided some safety for the surprised Board. It seems unlawfully accessing a company's network may be the least harmful of Powell's potential past-times. When police searched the former IT man’s home, over the porn and network problem, cops dug up far more than anticipated: law enforcement found guns -- and apparently some homemade silencers.
Powell was looking at up to 48 years in prison, greatly reduced after a guilty plea, while Baltimore Substance Abuse System got to "donate" about $80,000 bucks for security fixes or "upgrades" over the network attacks.
On the upside, everyone's alive. The presence of homemade silencers -- discovered at the IT man's home -- probably wasn't making Board members feel quite so secure.