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Disgruntled Gucci Employee Hacked Company's Network, DA Says

By DNAinfo Staff on April 4, 2011 9:09pm

A display inside the Fifth Avenue Gucci retail store in Manhattan.
A display inside the Fifth Avenue Gucci retail store in Manhattan.
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By Shayna Jacobs

DNAinfo Reporter/Producer

MANHATTAN SUPREME COURT —  A disgruntled former network engineer for the Manhattan office of Gucci America allegedly hacked the system and cost the company $200,000 in losses, effectively shutting down productivity for a day, prosecutors said Monday. 

The company lost access to email for almost 24 hours and some files and emails were deleted permanently because of the alleged network heist by former IT engineer Sam Chihlung Yin, 34, in November 2010.

Yin was indicted on charges of computer tampering, identity theft, computer trespass and other offenses and faces up to 15 years in prison if convicted of the top count.

He allegedly used passwords he stole from the company to access the network and corrupt their system. His attack on the email server affected store managers nation-wide and the e-commerce division, prosecutors said.

"Gucci's IT staff was unable to restore system operations until the end of the business day, and the lingering effects of the intrusion continued to impose costs on the company in the weeks and months that followed," read a release on his indictment.

Yin was allegedly fired from Gucci in May 2010 for using his employee discount to buy goods that he resold for profit in Asia. Prosecutors said the hacking was purely retaliatory.

He was released without bail after his arraignment Monday and is due back in court on May 31.