In spring 2014, Michael Leaper, the former technical infrastructure director at Columbia Sportswear, resigned to join an IT contractor. Before his departure, he created a fake employee account named Jeff Manning with VPN and virtual desktop access. Additionally, he elevated the privileges of an unused service account, svcmon.
Using the fake account, Leaper accessed the corporate network over 700 times during a two-year period. He monitored the emails of IT staff responsible for equipment procurement to gain competitive intelligence for his new employer. The unauthorized account was discovered by chance in summer 2016 during a mail system update.
Following the discovery, legal action was taken against Leaper. In December 2017, the court sentenced him to three years of probation and 400 hours of community service.
