Sys-Admins Reading the Bosses Mail?

PetManimal writes "Computerworld has an article about IT staff who have access to corner-office email. Systems administrators, database administrators, storage administrators and higher level IT super users are the types who may access sensitive executive information; one source quoted in the article says that in a company with 1,500 employees, there might typically be five to 10 administrators who have this access. As for how many abuse these priviledges, it's hard to tell, but rogue admins out for workplace revenge or personal gain can wreak havoc: '... Experts agree that the severity of these occurrences generally makes them more harmful than external attacks. One of the biggest obstacles to eliminating unauthorized access is determining how many people have it. Access lists are particularly difficult to formulate in both mature companies, where the number and power of administrators have expanded over periods of years, and small companies, where rapid growth leads to undocumented tangles of administrators who are able to maintain their access because nobody has time to assess their status.'"

apparently they never read BOFH!

[ezh]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BOFH [wikipedia.org]

Anonymous

[gt_mattex]

I get the feeling there is going to be quite a few AC posts on this one.

Bah old news...

[Lumpy]

I read this last week when my boss submitted the article to that magazine in his outgoing email.

Gotta go, he's sending an email now about outsourcing the IT department!

Re:And slashdot comments?

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

What about the /. admins who can read our highly sensitive comments?

Comments? I'm not even sure they read the article summaries.

Re:Anonymous

[Anonymous Coward]

Yesterday my boss got an email saying I was to be fired. I changed it so I got promoted instead.

This is old news.

[generic]

I already read it in cmdrtaco's inbox. Seriously I bet a good number of IT people own the T-Shirt, "I read your email". We aren't kidding.

Re:Clearance Control

[Anonymous Coward]

So now there is a discreet pool of clearances.

Well there was, until you went and told everyone!

Re:And slashdot comments?

[Lehk228]

i assure you the vast majority of slashdot comments are in fact, insensitive

Re:Bah old news...

[Anonymous Coward]

"imeadeatly"

Really? That's the best you could do? It's a terrible attempt.

Trust me

[Anonymous Coward]

It would never occur to me to take advantage of my responsibilities as a sys admin to use private information for personal gain.

John Smith
CIO, CFO, CEO
MegaCorp, Inc.
Employee of the Month
Employee of the Year
Grand Exalted Poohbah
Keeper of Keys
Omniscient All-Seeing Eye

bounces are better

[Bigbutt]

As the e-mail admin receiving the bounces are even more enlightening. There was a torrid love exchange in e-mail going on but they'd put an extra, invalid e-mail address in so the thread kept bouncing down to us. We tried to let them know about the problem but they were ignoring our messages.

I created a t-shirt for work a couple of years back when I heard someone saying that we were reading their e-mails.

"I Read Your E-mail"
" It's Boring " :D

[John]

Re:And slashdot comments?

[cp.tar]

... and probably written by clods.

Re:Clearance Control

[griffjon]

And the reality, a week later, when the boss has problems/forgot his super-cool passphrase and you're now locked out of his information, too.

Re:Clearance Control

[Captain Splendid]

Okay, I can access everything, everyone else can access their own shit. Done.

It's like you read my mind. Freaky.

Re:Fucking Computerworld fear-mongering!

[dmihalko]

But you do have time to read slashdot?

Re:Clearance Control

[h4rm0ny]

That's one good example. Another is secretaries. Everything confidential seems to go through them in a small business and they always seem to need access to all the sensitive areas of the network.

Incidentally, I run the network at my current employers. Shortly after starting, I restructured all the groups to make it more secure. I then matter of factly told them that I'd removed my access to certain areas that I didn't have the right to access. On occasion, I've added myself back on to accomplish certain things for them. They always find that hugely amusing.

Re:And slashdot comments?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, the title for an article about an admin reading the e-mail of a single boss would be:

English: "Sys-Admins Reading the Boss' Mail?"
Slashdot: "Sys-Admins Reading the Bosses Mail?"

For an admin reading the e-mail of more than one boss, the title would be:

English: "Sys-Admins Reading the Bosses' Mail?"
Slashdot: "Sys-Admins Reading the Bosseses Mail?"

Re:Secretaries are a bigger issue

[SpecBear]

I was once trying to explain to an exec why his account would never be absolutely secure.

Me: "If somebody wants your account information badly enough, he's going to get it. He doesn't have to hack the system, he can just get it from you."
Exec: "That's crazy, I'd never give anyone my password."
Me: "Imagine you come home and find someone's broken in. He's got a gun to your daughter's head, and he tells you he's going to shoot in ten seconds if you don't give him your password. What would you do?"
Exec: [long pause] ... Which daughter?

To this day I still don't know if he was joking. But I no longer use that example.