A former IT worker for designer label Gucci stands accused of hacking its private network and locking employees out of email and document systems, causing $200,000-worth of damage.

A US court has indicted Sam Chihlung Yin on 50 charges, including computer trespass, identity theft and unauthorised use of a computer.

Yin, who had previously been fired by Gucci, used a fake account he had previously created to log into the company’s virtual private network, according to the indictment.

Once he had accessed the network, Yin deleted a number of virtual servers, it is claimed, taking down Gucci’s email and document systems. These could not be recovered for 24 hours, which reportedly cost the company $200,000 in lost productivity and other expenses.

"Computer hacking is not a game," commented Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance, Jr. "It is a serious threat to corporate security that can have a devastating effect on personal privacy, jobs, and the ability of a business to function at all."

In a blog post discussing the case, Sophos senior technology consultant Graham Clulely remarked that "the message we should all learn from this sorry case is the importance of reviewing your user database and removing unknowns, changing passwords and resetting access rights when a member of your staff leaves your employment."