Free Newsletters
InfoWorld Daily

InfoWorld
Log-in | Register

Parts of San Francisco network still locked out

Administrators are still locked out of the city's VoIP system and LANs within the Sheriff's Department and the Recreation & Park Department


The high-profile troubles on the city of San Francisco's computer network continue, despite a dramatic jailhouse intervention by the city's mayor this week.

While the city has regained control of the five devices at the heart of its FiberWAN network, which carries data between city government buildings, administrators are still locked out of the city's VoIP system and local LANs within the Sheriff's Department and the Recreation & Park Department. Assistant District Attorney Conrad Del Rosario revealed the ongoing problems Wednesday at a bail hearing for Terry Childs, the former network administrator with the city's Department of Telecommunications and Information Services (DTIS) who is accused of holding the city's networks hostage for the past 10 days.

[ Read InfoWorld's scoop: "Why San Francisco's network admin went rogue" | Paul Venezia has technical analysis of the city's case against Childs ]

During that time, the networks have functioned normally, but IT staffers have been unable to make administrative changes to some of the city's critical routers and switches.

Childs' attorney, Erin Crane, had moved for a reduction in the $5 million bail set in the case. San Francisco Superior Court Judge Lucy McCabe denied that motion Wednesday.

Childs' defense has portrayed him as a capable engineer, surrounded by incompetent management, who simply didn't trust anyone with the administrative passwords to the five network devices at the heart of the FiberWAN. On Monday, Childs had a secret meeting with San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom where Childs turned over the passwords.

Del Rosario argued against any reduction of bail, noting that Childs handed over the passwords only after a scheduled July 19 power outage at the city's One Market Street datacenter failed to take down the FiberWAN. Because Childs did not store network configuration files on the routers' hard drives, a power outage would wipe this information out of memory, disabling the network until it was reconfigured, he said.

Continued
1 | 2 | NEXT PAGE » 


Talkback:

commentPost a Comment

 

MOST COMMENTS

 
 





MIGRATING TO VISTA
Join Windows Vista Expert, Richard Whitehead as he presents the benefits and challenges of migrating to Windows Vista. Sponsored by Novell

»  Click here to view this Webcast
  Planning For A Disaster
This new, comprehensive Solutions Guide is your one stop source for Disaster Recovery. In it you'll learn how to reduce the likelihood of a disaster and to create a rock solid business continuity plan should you face a disaster situation. Sponsored by Equallogic

»  Click here to download now

- Special Advertising Partners -
WHITE PAPERS
 

» Technology White Papers Library

Technology White Papers by Topic

Technology White Papers E-mail Alert

Find out when the latest white paper is available:
 
 
INFOWORLD MARKETPLACE
 
» BUY A LINK NOW
 
 

Video

 
 
 

Podcasts

 
IFW Daily 10/15/2008

Microsoft hopes Oslo will be app dev game-changer, Intel's earnings up...

 
 

 

Columnists

 
 
 

Resource Center


Ads by techwords beta  [See your link here]
 




Sponsored Technology Links

 
 
 HOME  NEWS  BLOGS  PODCASTS  VIDEOS  TECHNOLOGIES  TEST CENTER  EVENTS  CAREERS   About | Advertise | Awards | RSS | Contact Us 

Copyright © 2008, Reprints, Permissions, Licensing, IDG Network, Privacy Policy, Terms of Service.
All Rights reserved. InfoWorld is a leading publisher of technology information and product reviews on topics including viruses,
phishing, worms, firewalls, security, servers, storage, networking, wireless, databases, and web services.

CIO :: ComputerWorld :: CSO :: Demo :: GamePro :: Games.net :: IDG Connect :: IDG World Expo
Industry Standard :: IT World :: JavaWorld :: LinuxWorld :: MacUser :: Macworld :: Network World :: PC World :: Playlist