In the Mike Judge cult comedy Office Space, Peter Gibbons (Ron Livingston) hates his job at Initech trying to fix the upcoming Y2K bug. Still, when the company brings in consultants to decide who to downsize, he and his friends hatch a plan just in case they get the cut. The two peers, Samir Nagheenanajar (Ajay Naidu) and Michael Bolton (David Herman) infect Initech’s accounting system with a virus designed to steal off fractions of fractions of mere cents over time to a separate bank account. Thinking it would be small enough to be untraceable, the virus quickly takes $300,000, and the men panic with hilarious results.
Over 20 years later, despite being a box office flop at the time, Office Space has become a true cult classic with recognizable quotes and a merchandising machine selling everything from board games to apparel of all sorts. It apparently influenced a man who tried to do a similar scam and got caught.
Former Zulily employee, Ermenildo Valdez Castro thought he’d get away by trying the same scheme on the online shopping company, even labeling the operation the “Office Space project” on his work laptop. Court records from the Seattle Times showed how he introduced a code to siphon money away from the e-commerce company and wire it into his personal account. Castro introduced his malware in February 2022 which affected more than 30,000 transactions.
Castro is accused of stealing more than $300,000 from Zulily, including $260,000 in electronic payments and more than $40,000 in merchandise. He told police “that he named his scheme to steal from Zulily after the movie.” His court date is January 26.
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