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Sacked IT director banged up for revenge hack attack

File deletion leads to new job sewing mailbags

An IT director who took revenge on his former employer following his dismissal by hacking its website and deleting files has been jailed for 27 months.

Darnell H Albert-El, 53, of Richmond, Virginia, who admitted the cyber-assault against systems at Transmarx, was also ordered to pay $6,700 in restitution to his former employer, at a sentencing hearing before US District Judge Robert E Payne.

Albert-El responded to losing his job in June 2008 by using his own (still active) admin access login credentials to log into Transmarx's systems and deleting around 1,000 files in a fit of pique a month later in July 2008, local paper the Richmond Times Dispatch reports.

The information was backed up and little damage was done, with Transmarx claiming for losses of just $6,000. Albert-El can therefore consider himself unfortunate at receiving any prison sentence, much less one of this length.

Transmarx sells discounted telecom equipment and supplies. The attack on its systems was investigated by agents from the FBI.

A Justice Department statement on the case can be found here. ®

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