Oh boy, we've reached the going around and confiscating everyone's computer phase of the game.
New Orleans Inspector General Ed Michel’s office has seized the computer of a city IT worker involved in the “smart city” contracting process, an indication that the canceled project has spawned an investigation from the city’s top watchdog.
The IG seizure of a city computer assigned to Christopher Wolff occurred on Wednesday, according to Wolff's attorney and City Council President Helena Moreno.
Wolff’s lawyer, Michael Kennedy, told Moreno’s office that the seizure would complicate his ability to comply with an subpoena request from the City Council for reams of documents related to the smart city project.
Thinking back to the Hard Rock aftermath, recall that there were at least three or four independent investigations into the Safety and Permits department operated by the feds, by the City Council, by the Inspector General, and I don't remember who Ken Polite was working for at the time but he was there too. Anyway it seemed at times that the various probes hired by various entities with different interests may have worked at cross purposes a little bit.
That might be what's about to happen with the "Smart Cities" mess. We can't give you any evidence because somebody else already came and took it, etc.
Also it's worth remembering what happened the last time city officials had to turn over digital evidence during an investigation of a tech corruption scandal.
After a public solicitation, Nagin hired the Louisiana Technology Council to conduct a forensic search. He fired the group in July after its president, Mark Lewis, and a colleague held a news conference to say they failed to find any of the information. They also said they suspected a tech-savvy person had intentionally removed the mayor's e-mail inbox from the server months earlier.
Nagin then hired SunBlock to resume searching for the missing data. He also asked the new firm to review and report on LTC's efforts.
In its report, SunBlock dismisses LTC's claim that Nagin's files were deliberately erased, saying LTC misinterpreted a technical analysis used to detect whether data were deleted.
I guess we're about to find out how far the science of email deletion/undeletion has advanced over the course of the last decade.
No comments:
Post a Comment