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Datacenter Robbed for the Fourth Time in Two Years
Posted by
Zonk
on Sat Nov 03, 2007 06:36 PM
from the that's-quite-a-router-failure dept.
from the that's-quite-a-router-failure dept.
mariushm writes "According to the Register, the Chicago-based colocation datacenter C I Host was attacked by armed intruders recently, making it the the fourth time in two years that armed thugs have made off with data. According to a letter C I Host officials sent customers, 'At least two masked intruders entered the suite after cutting into the reinforced walls with a power saw ... During the robbery, C I Host's night manager was repeatedly tazered and struck with a blunt instrument. After violently attacking the manager, the intruders stole equipment belonging to C I Host and its customers.' Aggravating the situation, C I Host representatives took several days to admit the most recent breach, according to several customers who said they lost equipment, all the while reporting the problems as 'router failures'."
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The evil thing here (Score:5, Insightful)
And if they have been robbed before - why not increase the security? Four times? - That's some kind of record. Maybe it's time to check if the localization of the whole thing is incorrect and move it to a better location where it's less likely to suffer from this kind of incident?
Re:The evil thing here (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:The evil thing here - continuation. (Score:5, Informative)
Anyway - maybe it's time to weave in copper mesh into the T-shirt of all datacenter employees to protect against tazers.
And notice from a comment to the article that any so called man trap doesn't exist - and the security seems to have been far too relaxed. Just a fine example of how not to do things. A good datacenter is located where almost nobody knows where it is - preferably underground in a nondescript location in the countryside. A set of optical fibers will take care of all the traffic. And very few persons shall have physical access to the hardware. Think about how the military handles their datacenters.
Parent
Re:The evil thing here - continuation. (Score:5, Interesting)
The datacenter in question is in a terrible neighborhood, and I can't see anyone bothering a truck there in the dead of night.
There was no man trap, and no security of any sort, just a tech guy who let me in and opened the glass datacenter door for me.
I doubt they have a panic button of any sort either.
You disable the one guy on call and there would be no police coming, period.
Parent
Re:The evil thing here (Score:5, Interesting)
So, they're looking to hire people that carry guns that are willing to accept a job at minimum wage. That should tell you something right there.
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Re:The evil thing here (Score:5, Interesting)
In a more, uh... "free" state, yes, armed security is a realistic proposition. However such states usually have less violent crime too, so you don't need them as much.
Parent
Re:The evil thing here (Score:5, Funny)
Sounds like a great reason to locate a data center in Texas.
-jcr
Parent
To be fair, there was a router failure (Score:5, Funny)
Still in business? (Score:5, Insightful)
The entire purpose of off-site storage is disaster recovery, and prevention of major disasters like this. Why are these guys still in business?
Re:Still in business? (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
location, location, location (Score:5, Funny)
Fool me once.... (Score:5, Insightful)
A few possibilities.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Well, if they actually care enough to try to prevent these attacks, I can see three solutions, any of which should be highly effective:
Deadly force. If you are being robbed at gunpoint on a regular basis, your employees can legitimately say that they fear for their lives, and thus, purchasing of firearms is legally and morally justifiable. Perhaps a couple of guards posted at the entrance with semiautomatic rifles, plus three or four in appropriately concealed locations within the facility (or more if the facility is large enough). Criminals (armed or not) will think twice before attacking.
Electrical interference. Hook a 230 kV transmission line directly to the rebar in the walls. Anyone who tries to cut their way in will likely spontaneously combust, or at the very least, be knocked several meters. Such an attack won't happen twice.
Oxygen deprivation. You probably already have halon fire extinguishers. Assign everyone emergency oxygen masks and a red button remote. In the event of an attack, press the red button and put on your oxygen mask. Assuming you dump enough halon, it will bond with all the free oxygen in the room, incapacitating or killing the intruders in seconds. Assuming they survive, they should still be unconscious when the police arrive to arrest them.
Re:A few possibilities.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
I'm one of the victims.... (Score:5, Informative)
I was one of the victims... (Score:5, Interesting)
CI Host Chicago (Score:5, Informative)
First, this datacenter is literally two blocks from what is left of the infamous Cabrini-Green projects. Tough neighborhood, so it's not entirely impossible that it is an outside cracked-up scheme.
There was none of the double-man-trap doors or whatever there. The one staffer was in the back playing a Playstation. The couple of customers in the center exchanged cell numbers, so we could call each other to get let back when we needed to use the toilet.
The Dallas billing people weren't any better. Worst... host... ever.
Your server is down.. (Score:5, Funny)
Cut through RC walls? Sounds fishy to me. (Score:5, Informative)
Now, this is a non-technical publication, so "reinforced" may mean anything - like a 1/2" bar at the top and bottom, and around jambs. Also, this is Chicago, known far and wide for severe corruption in the building inspection process.
Still, anything close to a RC wall is going to require a diamond blade and a gas powered saw for any kind of efficiency at all, and the cut rate is going to be measured in single-digit (or fractional) inches per minute. Most also require a water source for cooling. You'd have to be utterly incompetent not to catch these guys before they got in.
couldn't of happened to a nicer company ;) (Score:5, Insightful)
http://www.spamhaus.org/sbl/listings.lasso?isp=cihost.com [spamhaus.org]
Here is a copy of the police reports (Score:5, Informative)
Report 1 Page 1 [imageshack.us]
Report 1 Page 2 [imageshack.us]
Report 2 Page 1 [imageshack.us]
Report 2 Page 2 [imageshack.us]
Report 3 Page 1 [imageshack.us]
Report 3 Page 2 [imageshack.us]
The guy says that $50,000 worth of stuff was stolen...not only servers, but misc crap like routers, and battery chargers for Black Berry units.
I'd say either look for a new web host startup in the Chicago area in the next year, or a lot of stuff going cheap on Ebay.
The saddest part about this is that the crims clubbed and zapped some innocent guy that would have offered zero resistance. For this, I hope they thieves go to jail for a long time.
Maybe they (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Obligatory... (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:where are the rent a cops at? (Score:5, Funny)
No, one door to the left in the clutch room.
rj
Parent
Re:inside job (Score:5, Interesting)
A friend of mine that used to work there said that "being in jail was a fairly common excuse for missing work there". The employees seemed to hate working there, to put it mildly.
And the cokehead that owned the company loved to fire employees at a moment's notice, left and right. I highly doubt there's any employee loyalty there.
So in short, you've got highly unhappy employees that get fired at an amazing rate, with some seriously negative employee loyalty and they're surprised when stuff gets stolen?
Parent