IT Baseline Protection Manual - The Information Warfare Site

Threats Catalogue Deliberate Acts Remarks
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T 5.1 Manipulation or destruction of IT equipment
or accessories
External - as well as internal - perpetrators may for various reasons (revenge,
malice, frustration) try to manipulate or destroy IT equipment, accessories,
documents, or the like. The later such manipulations are detected, the greater
the knowledge acquired by the perpetrator and the more far-reaching the
impact on a work operation, the more effective they are. The effects range
from unauthorised viewing of sensitive data to the destruction of data media or
IT systems, which could result in these being out of action for prolonged
periods.
Example:
An employee in a company used his knowledge of the fact that an important
server was sensitive to excessive operating temperatures and blocked the vent
slots for the power unit fan with an object placed behind the server. Two days
later the hard disk in the server sustained a fault induced by overheating and
the server was out of action for several days. The attacker subsequently
claimed that it was a simply a matter of an oversight.
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IT-Baseline Protection Manual: Oktober 2000
Various motives