Fighting malware and spam

No rest for German police

Arrest of suspected Sasser author, arrest of suspected Phatbot author and questioning of five more suspects - all within the space of 7 days.

The German authorities have been busy this month, having made the arrests of suspected Sasser and Netsky author Sven Jaschan and of the suspected Phatbot author last week, and this week questioning five more individuals in connection with Sasser and Netsky.

With having caused disarray in Taiwan's state-run national post office, downing computers of 25 departments of the South African government and causing major operational problems for the UK coastguard listing just a small number of its enormously disruptive effects, Sasser has been estimated to have cost $500 million so far.

Following the arrest of 18-year old German Sven Jaschan in connection with creating and distributing Sasser, German police have questioned a further five in connection with distributing Sasser and Netsky. But, while two of the five admitted that they had been given source code for Netsky, and one admitted helping to circulate Netsky, no further arrests have been made.

Jaschan, who confessed to having created Netsky.A after his arrest, has been released pending charges, but some reports suggest that he may escape formal punishment because he was arrested only a day after his 18th birthday - and since the alleged crime of computer sabotage was apparently committed before this, some he may be tried as a juvenile.

If Jaschan is convicted, his informants could be on the receiving end of the first payout of Microsoft's $5 million 'anti-virus reward program'. The individuals who provided the tip-off to Microsoft have been informed that the company will consider providing a reward of up to $250,000 if their information leads to the (arrest and) conviction of the Sasser perpetrator.

13 May 2004

Tags: virus