A former software developer has been sentenced to four years in prison for sabotaging his former employer’s network after leaving the company. Davis Lu, 55, was convicted of installing a “kill switch” on the network by planting malicious code designed to crash its servers in the event that he was fired.
The kill switch was activated when the company terminated Lu’s employment and deactivated his credentials. This triggered a script named “IsDLEnabledinAD,” which checked whether Lu’s account was still active in the company’s Active Directory. The incident locked out thousands of employees from accessing the company’s systems.
The Justice Department, which prosecuted the case, said Lu’s employer was reportedly the power tech company Eaton. The incident caused hundreds of thousands of dollars in damage. Lu was discovered in part through his internet search history, which included searches for methods to escalate privileges, hide processes, and rapidly delete files.