A federal jury in Cleveland has convicted a senior software developer, Davis Lu, of sabotaging his former employer, Eaton Corporation’s, computer systems. Lu, 55, faces up to ten years in prison.
Lu, who worked at Eaton from 2007 to 2019, began deploying malicious code after a demotion in 2019. He created a Java program that crashed production systems by generating infinite resource-consuming threads. He also developed a “kill switch” that locked out thousands of employees worldwide when his employment was terminated. The “kill switch” code was named “IsDLEnabledinAD”, abbreviating “Is Davis Lu enabled in Active Directory”.
Investigators found Lu’s malware and related code on internal development servers, linking his user account to the sabotage. He attempted to delete data and wipe his company laptop before returning it. Lu confessed to federal investigators in 2019 but pleaded not guilty, leading to the jury trial and his subsequent conviction.