ABSTRACT
We often provide our enemies the means for our own destruction. Aesop (c. 620-560 BC)
Computer systems sabotage may arise during industrial disputes, as a result of personal or ideological grievance, as a measure to generate overtime payments, contract renewals or extensions, to blackmail and extort, to conceal evidence of crime or wrongdoing, or as a political protest or prank:
According to the Wall Street Journal (January 29, 2001), outgoing Clinton-Gore staffers at the White House performed a range of ‘pranks’ including prizing the W (‘Dubya’) key from many White House computer keyboards, super-glueing drawers
on office desks, infecting computers with viruses, recording offensive reception messages on answering machines, slashing telephone lines, loading pornographic images on printers and computers, writing graffiti on corridors and bathroom walls, turning desks upside down, and, as a valedictory sign-off, leaving a trail of trash across the West Wing. Damage was conservatively estimated at $200 000.
