Sony execs are shedding crocodile tears over the latest IT security breach that brought substantial financial losses to the company. Let’s not dwell on the trivial: who did it and why are irrelevant technicalities. How this hack was possible, on the other hand, is the question worth our attention.

Some years ago SPE, like so many other large American companies, set out to outsource its IT support. The outsourcing experience invariably brings loss of quality. The outcome is predictable and inevitable when you seek hi-tech expertise on an industrial scale in countries where a personal computer is still a rarity.

Over a year ago Sony brass bragged about a cost-cutting initiative that supposedly saved the company as much as one hundred million dollars. In a penny-pinching frenzy SPE shipped what little remained of its on-shore IT support to the East Indies. The awesome results of this masterpiece of management and business administration we’re witnessing this week. Job well done and bonuses all around.

I will admit this: as a sysadmin, I am impartial to the concept of IT outsourcing. Loss of expertise is not even the greatest concern, but loss of personal responsibility is. I’ve been both the outsourcer and the outsourcee and this experience allows me to state unequivocally: the only loser in this money-making scheme are the end users – company employees and customers. The execs… Well, the execs are made of better stuff than the rest of us: they know how to take their losses with dignity and million-dollar bonus checks.

Oh well, just sayin’…