San Francisco’s computer network was still being held hostage Thursday, allegedly by a disgruntled employee who programmed the system with a password only he knows. Terry Childs, 43, was jailed Sunday night. He has a 25-year-old criminal record in Kansas for aggravated robbery that had been disclosed at the date he was hired.

No Administrator Access

San Francisco’s IT branch was trying to regain control of the network, which was running and handling everything from the mayor’s e-mail to San

Francisco’s electronic court records. Currently all IT administrators are denied access.

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, Mayor Gavin Newsom said administrators were blocked from making changes to the city’s computer network, so whether the system were to crash, workers could not undertake repairs or upgrades.

Cisco Systems has been consulted, and estimates are that in the worst case, the network could be rebuilt from scratch in six to eight weeks. Childs […]

Orginal post by Top Tech News