Worm traps alleged child porn offender

Computer worm sends out phony police-investigation warning, tricking man accused of child porn crimes into turning himself in.

The story "Worm traps alleged child porn offender" published December 20, 2005 at 4:24 AM is no longer available on CNET News.

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Nice...

Good job virus writers. It's things like this that I like to throw in people's faces when they go bashing hackers/crackers/virus writers.

I'm sure the motive behind it wasn't purely aimed at this guy. But none-the-less, it ended happily.

And to think if he had owned a Mac he wouldn't have been caught!

[Bob Brinkman]

Iam going to go ahead and infer

From your statement that all Mac owners are pederasts. ZING!

Sorry, I know the trolling is out of hand here but that is too good of a set up to pass.

[alegr]

Get a clue

You mean, if you have a MAC, you don't read emails, dont' get any spam?
They guy's demise was NOT because his computer was compromised by the worm. It was because he simply read an email he received, and took it for a real thing.

[Dead Soulman]

Kudos

I like this. Whomever created this worm needs a medal. I hate these sick and perverted bastards that look at child porn.

Hackers, crackers, and/or whatever else they want to be called actually make our cyber security better. Ask the major software companies if they don't use the services of these often bad mouthed folks.

[hadaso]

What a stupid story, with stupid policeman quoted!

There's nothing good about the Sober worm. And it's not the worm that turned the man in: it's the man's own stupidity (or at least ignorance).

Anything else is just as likely to trigger a criminal into thinking he's being caught, and there's nothing special in an email worm doing it!

But the real stupidity is in making this sound as if there's anything good in an email worm: the Sober worm is plain evil' that's all, wasting billions of working hours to people all around the world!

[jdbwar07]

Agreed

Yeah, the guy is obviously an idiot. Anyone who is tricked into turning themselves in for a crime because of an obviously fake generated email is a complete moron.
Now people are defending worms because of this freak incident. I hate malware, spreading it should be a crime, plain and simple.


Hypothetical situation by the same logic:
A disturbed man, who isn't affiliated with any law enforcement agency, puts on a fake police uniform and randomly walks up to a house and rings the doorbell. He then mumbles informing the person answering that he's under investigation and needs to be brought in. The man is scared and then confesses a real murder. Therefore, it's good to impersonate a police officer in case someone would be tricked into turning themselves in.

[Carlos Alvarez]

Worms are a stupid invention of stupid men

Inventing a web worm is as irresponsible as to poison an acueduct of a city just for the fun of watching people die.
The guy who turned himself up into police hands is an innocent victim of his own ignorance and does not have a right to blame the web worm for his candidness.

Actually

I don't get spam. So you get a clue. Trolling schmuck.

[c.e.neal]

excellant

i'm glad the worm scared one of those freaks into turning himself in

[TerrorKilla]

worms useage

at last sum good use 4 a worm
mayb the cops can use it 2 track criminals