[HN Gopher] Former Disney employee who hacked Disney World menus...
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Former Disney employee who hacked Disney World menus sentenced to 3
years
Author : aa_is_op
Score : 45 points
Date : 2025-04-27 13:42 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (databreaches.net)
(TXT) w3m dump (databreaches.net)
| derektank wrote:
| >These intrusions included manipulating allergen information in
| restaurant menus to indicate that food items were safe for
| customers with certain allergies, when they were not. Scheuer
| also altered menu information related to wine regions to reflect
| locations of recent mass shootings. Additionally, Scheuer
| launched denial-of-service attacks designed to lock certain
| company employees out of their accounts.
|
| Endangering third parties in an effort to take revenge on your
| former employer is sociopath territory.
| kayodelycaon wrote:
| > Endangering third parties in an effort to take revenge on
| your former employer is sociopath territory.
|
| I don't think that really does. I think it's common human
| behavior to not think about the third parties you're actually
| endangering and only focusing on who you're trying to hurt.
|
| We don't like to think of ourselves that way but it's
| relatively easy to push buttons on a human and get them to do
| things we would regard as "sociopathic" with out the person
| themselves being a sociopath. See On Killing by Dave Grossman.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _not think about the third parties you 're actually
| endangering and only focusing on who you're trying to hurt_
|
| Right. That's sociopathic hate. Note that OP didn't say
| psychopathic, which is something one is born with.
| esalman wrote:
| Corporations are cybernetic entities devoid of human qualities.
| tinix wrote:
| what do you think cybernetic means?
|
| people have been misusing the term cybernetic for a while
| now, I've noticed...
| tinix wrote:
| what do you think cybernetic means?
|
| people have been misusing the term cybernetic for a while
| now, I've noticed...
| gruez wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cybernetics
|
| Despite the word "cyber", it doesn't refer to brain
| implants or computers.
| adolph wrote:
| Cybernetic refers to systems of communication and automated
| control, which would describe the purpose of a corp in a
| broad sense, no?
|
| The Dan Davies book "The Accountability Machine" [0] makes
| the link between corps and cybernetics through early
| business author/consultants like Stafford Beer [1].
|
| 0. https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/U/bo25
| 2799...
|
| 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_purpose_of_a_system_is
| _wha...
| maronato wrote:
| He wasn't just endangering them; he was weaponizing them
| against Disney. His goal was for their deaths to become
| lawsuits and PR crises.
| xyst wrote:
| yea, to be honest guy deserves much more than 3 yrs.
|
| There are ways to kill a corporation without the need to use
| the same playbook as corporations (using others as pawns to
| get a point across).
| ycombinatrix wrote:
| So it is okay to use people as pawns if you are a
| corporation?
| brutal_chaos_ wrote:
| I can see where you may get that idea, but I believe the
| point was supposed to be: just because it is done, it
| doesn't mean you can do it too. And that also doesn't
| mean it's ok for corporations to do it, they just have an
| easier time than the common person because our society
| runs and money and they have (much!) more of it.
| ilovecurl wrote:
| I wonder if there was a connection to the ongoing wrongful death
| lawsuit after a doctor suffered a fatal allergic reaction at a
| Disney World restaurant? That's the one where Disney tried to get
| her widower's lawsuit tossed by pointing to the fine print of a
| Disney+ trial he had signed up for years earlier.
| shadowgovt wrote:
| Not directly. His changes were never seen by the public.
| add-sub-mul-div wrote:
| They wouldn't be pointing to the fine print of a Disney+ trial
| if they had a murderer they could point to.
| zardo wrote:
| They would. Someone hacking their computers and causing a
| death doesn't necessarily absolve them of liability, while a
| waver of liability could do exactly that.
| Enginerrrd wrote:
| With all due respect that is just not how lawyers operate.
| They can and will use every argument within their constraints
| that can lead to a win. That's their job. They are even
| allowed to put forth arguments that are mutually exclusive
| and nonsensical when taken together.
| add-sub-mul-div wrote:
| Very well, if there was a connection to a person who even
| potentially caused the death with mischief it would
| obviously be part of the story and in the headline, was the
| point.
| dghlsakjg wrote:
| Yea, but lawyers for the biggest corporations on earth also
| have to be aware of when their actions will cost in
| goodwill and publicity.
|
| Making a weak legal argument that is bound to highlight the
| heartlessness of a corporation that tries to be famously
| accommodating and friendly to guests is a move that should
| have been caught before the argument was filed.
|
| How much in goodwill and PR work did it cost them to make
| an argument that would have saved them maybe a million
| dollars in the unlikely event it worked.
|
| There's a reason that corporations will often settle cases
| that they are legally in the right for, and cost benefit
| analyses are a huge part of that.
| acjohnson55 wrote:
| 3 years seems extreme. Drunk drivers mostly don't get jail time.
| xyst wrote:
| I would normally agree but digging into the details of this
| incident:
|
| > Note that this allegedly vengeful former employee also risked
| public health and safety. By editing the menus to suggest that
| certain items were safe for people with peanut allergies when
| they weren't, he risked people having life-threatening
| anaphylactic incidents. There is no allegation that anyone was
| actually harmed or injured, however, as Disney detected the
| alterations before menus could be sent out to restaurants
|
| https://databreaches.net/2024/10/30/fbi-investigated-disney-...
| londons_explore wrote:
| A drunk driver far more directly puts people at risk than a
| menu with incorrect allergen information.
|
| Fewer than 1% of allergy incidents result in death, which
| can't be said for drunk driver crashes.
| rightbyte wrote:
| What's up with all these strange analogies.
|
| This would be programming a machine to print "non-
| alcoholic" on alcoholic beer in such an analogy about drunk
| drivers.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| Intent. Drunk drivers are being stupid and dangerous. This
| person was intentionally dangerous.
| queenkjuul wrote:
| Drunk driving is also intentional
| DangitBobby wrote:
| No. The intent of drunk driving is to get around. There is
| no malicious intent, just extreme negligence.
| brigandish wrote:
| Negligence, and recklessness, which is where I would
| place drunk driving, are both _mens rea_.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_negligence
| DangitBobby wrote:
| We are discussing intent.
| billy99k wrote:
| They deserve more time. Changing food allergin warnings could
| have killed someone.
| stainablesteel wrote:
| what a wild situation, were their menus digital or did he edit a
| pdf in their database somewhere?
| FinnKuhn wrote:
| From what I can tell Disney has digital and printed menus. A
| prior article [1] offers more information on how he did it:
| "...has admitted to hacking into the company's menu creation
| software" and "... formerly worked as the company's Menu
| Production Manager...".
|
| I assume that the software probably controls all menus, both
| digital and printed.
|
| [1] https://databreaches.net/2025/01/13/former-disney-
| employee-a...
| shadowgovt wrote:
| I've been looking at the stories about this and one thing I
| haven't been able to find: how was he able to modify the data in
| Disney's system after they fired him? Stole someone else's
| credentials, left a back door they didn't catch, or did they fail
| to switch him off?
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(page generated 2025-04-27 23:01 UTC)