American Programmer Outsources Job to China

[weirdee]

Is this illegal or something? Because I can't think of any laws he was breaking, they hired him to do a job, he was being given the work willingly by someone else.

Pretty sure this violates the terms of his employment contract, to say the least.

@retranslation: for some reason that's actually better than the original post

 

[BreakfastMan]

Dammit, I wish I had thought of that for my final projects last quarter... It would have made everything so much easier. D:

Also, this is freaking hilarious. XD

 

[w00tage]

"The U.S. critical infrastructure company lucky enough to have Bob on its payroll"...

Just a note on the lawbreaking thing, there are laws regulating the security of critical infrastructure services. He can't have broken anything but his contract, but he CAN have caused his utility to have broken laws by his actions. It would depend on the utility type (not all are regulated), the function of the systems he had access to and what kind of access he had.

 

[Reduced_Silver]

This story is not true. Like, at all.

 

[Talaris]

2 1/2 hours of Reddit and cat videos? Then 2 1/2 hours of Facebook? Every day?! I'm calling fake; no one clever enough to outsource his job for this long would have enough brain cells required after that much time on reddit.

I think I'd rather learn to do the programming. Or hell at least install some PC games on that office computer to waste away the hours with. Spending that much time on those sites would drive me insane.

 

[CriticalMiss]

2 1/2 hours of Reddit and cat videos? Then 2 1/2 hours of Facebook? Every day?! I'm calling fake; no one clever enough to outsource his job for this long would have enough brain cells required after that much time on reddit.

I think I'd rather learn to do the programming. Or hell at least install some PC games on that office computer to waste away the hours with. Spending that much time on those sites would drive me insane.

If he played WoW a Chinese guy could outsource his gold farming work to him and the cycle is complete.

 

[White-Death]

我剛聘請了一位飢餓的中國10歲寫我的文章。現在我可以了海盜的逃避現實的視頻和出售他們的錢整天!

 

[Paradoxrifts]

我剛聘請了一位飢餓的中國10歲寫我的文章。現在我可以了海盜的逃避現實的視頻和出售他們的錢整天!

Get back to doing my work, you lazy bum!

 

[Atmos Duality]

...How is this newsworthy?

Oh, the controversy of SUBCONTRACTING and MIDDLEMEN. Such scandal!
But it's got CHINA and OUTSOURCING in the headline! I'm supposed to feel fearful and angry, right?

 

[Ympulse]

Caveat to the story - The Chinese contractor most likely employs 5-10 workers per daily task. I sincerely doubt it was ONE guy, especially in China.

 

[Gilhelmi]

Is this illegal or something? Because I can't think of any laws he was breaking, they hired him to do a job, he was being given the work willingly by someone else.

I don't THINK its illegal, just kind of immoral I suppose. The company wont be happy with him mailing his security thing to china though. Probably will get fired for 'compromising system security' or something like that.

No, It is VERY illegal.

See, he signed a contract stating that he would not give the "doodad" to anyone else. Then he committed fraud by claiming credit for the work.

He probably will not be prosecuted, but he will be fired. Maybe, possibly, be force to repay the company for the potential security breaches. Remember, even though the "contractor" did stay above board and not abuse his access privileges, the risk of it and the company not being able to protect itself from espionage, means that 'Bob' may have to pay significant restitution.

I would really like to see the rest of the story as to what happened to him.

On a similar topic. In the US Military, We used our ID cards (called C.A.C. cards Controlled Access Cards) to access ANY government computer. It had a Chip in it, and we put the whole card in the computer. It has our Security Clearance, Pin Number, Fingerprints (for the biometrics that the were planning on installing later), and all of our personnel file. We could be written up and fined several hundred dollars for misplacing or mishandling them.

 

[Gilhelmi]

HOLY SHIT. I JUST READ THE LINKED ARTICLE.

This is bigger then we thought.

They?re a U.S. critical infrastructure company, and it was an unauthorized VPN connection from CHINA. The implications were severe and could not be overstated.

It could have been BAD infrastructure company means that this person had potential access to our infrastructure networks (power, water, nuclear power, ect). I mean what if the contractor was giving the system data to the Chinese government, or worse placing back-doors so they could access it later.

This will keep me up tonight.

 

[briankoontz]

HOLY SHIT. I JUST READ THE LINKED ARTICLE.

This is bigger then we thought.

They?re a U.S. critical infrastructure company, and it was an unauthorized VPN connection from CHINA. The implications were severe and could not be overstated.

It could have been BAD infrastructure company means that this person had potential access to our infrastructure networks (power, water, nuclear power, ect). I mean what if the contractor was giving the system data to the Chinese government, or worse placing back-doors so they could access it later.

This will keep me up tonight.

It shouldn't. The US is a huge market for Chinese goods and China would never take down their fat cat since their own economy would be decimated.

 

[AlwaysPractical]

Is this illegal or something? Because I can't think of any laws he was breaking, they hired him to do a job, he was being given the work willingly by someone else.

It's not illegal, it's just plagiarism. He submitted other people's work as his own, meaning the company will fire him. More importantly, one source explained that he FedEx'd the Chinese company his RSA token so that they could get into the company's VPN and submit the work as his. That is definitely a breach of company security.

 

[Gilhelmi]

HOLY SHIT. I JUST READ THE LINKED ARTICLE.

This is bigger then we thought.

They?re a U.S. critical infrastructure company, and it was an unauthorized VPN connection from CHINA. The implications were severe and could not be overstated.

It could have been BAD infrastructure company means that this person had potential access to our infrastructure networks (power, water, nuclear power, ect). I mean what if the contractor was giving the system data to the Chinese government, or worse placing back-doors so they could access it later.

This will keep me up tonight.

It shouldn't. The US is a huge market for Chinese goods and China would never take down their fat cat since their own economy would be decimated.

Ya, right up until our economy collapses because our government wont stop spending to make people poorer, or as I call it welfare (I refuse to look at welfare as anything else, we keep spending and spending, but people are staying on it longer and longer, This was pre-recession too. now It is even worse).

I like welfare, we just need real 'back-to-work' mandate (none of the current games the administration is playing). Force the hipsters to take jobs flipping burgers (until they can start their own business or find better jobs that are actually work), and then spend our welfare money on people who LEGITIMATELY can not work (like the sick or elderly).

Sorry for the rant, it is 0230 here and I get more annoyed at the stupid people in Washington the more tired I am

 

[Alar]

This is kind of hilarious, and reminds me of this:

Oh god! No wonder this sounded so familiar! XD

Someone obviously took this video seriously and ran with it.