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The Courts Government Security Worms News

Louisiana Man Pleads Guilty to Creating 911 Worm 365

Posted by timothy from the with-very-few-exceptions-is-not-a-worm dept.
mabu writes "The United States Attorney's Office for the Northern District of California announced that, roughly a year after his arrest, David Jeansonne pleaded guilty Tuesday to two criminal counts in a scheme that sent email to users of Microsoft's WebTV Internet service containing an attachment that, when opened, reprogrammed their computers to dial 9-1-1 without their knowledge. It still unclear what motivated this 43-year-old to launch such a bizarre worm."
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Louisiana Man Pleads Guilty to Creating 911 Worm More

Louisiana Man Pleads Guilty to Creating 911 Worm

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  • Maybe he thought he was doing them a favor... (Score:5, Funny)

    by punxking ( 721508 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:36PM (#11704847)
    "Help! I'm using WebTV!"

  • Hope he gets slammed (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Evil W1zard ( 832703 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:37PM (#11704865) Journal
    This was a very, very, very dumb thing to do on his part. I could see the courts giving him some leniency if he was 12, but at 43 years of age I think he will get what he deserves. Does anyone know if the worm caused any delays in getting through to the 911 system that caused serious injury or death?

    • Re:Hope he gets slammed (Score:5, Interesting)

      by tomstdenis ( 446163 ) <tomstdenis@gma[ ]com ['il.' in gap]> on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:42PM (#11704937) Homepage
      [YOA hater ranting here...]

      Why? When I was 12 I was actually AFRAID to call 911 unless it was dead serious [excuse the pun]. Now I use it to report bad drivers and routinely see people get pulled over by cops cuz of it ;-) [after following them around the city...].

      At 12 you should know that 911 isn't a toy. And if you don't AND are capable of writing a worm that dials 911 ... then you deserve to get a paddling.

      Tom

      • Re:Hope he gets slammed (Score:4, Funny)

        by bani ( 467531 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:44PM (#11704967)
        hopefully he will get a good paddling from his cellmate bubba.
        • That would be a "pounding", not a "paddling".

          If you don't know the difference, well... ask someone else.

        • Re:Hope he gets slammed (Score:5, Insightful)

          by pjt33 ( 739471 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @07:31PM (#11706143)
          Why is it that so many people seem to think anal rape in prison is funny?

          • Re:Hope he gets slammed (Score:5, Insightful)

            by localman ( 111171 ) on Friday February 18, 2005 @02:11AM (#11708563) Homepage
            Because we are no better than the people in Iraq we call barbarians for their "rape rooms".

            It's interesting to me how rarely it comes up that anal rape isn't funny: that it's torture, and torture is a criminal human rights violation that would have us clamoring to invade another country. Yet we not only allow it, we practical cheer for it. On a large scale.

            And for any fool who thinks it's about giving people their just desserts, tell me what happens when these anal gang raped men reenter society. What kind of respect for others do you think they'll have?

            And what type of people are in prison anyways? Dangerous people? Or non-violent pot-smokers or what?

            Anyways... sorry for the rant but it's amazing how at this point in human history mob mentality still rules even the most allegedly civilized nations.

            Cheers.
      • Wow, I don't know what part of the country you live in, but around here you could potentially go to JAIL for abusing the 911 service like that. Unless there is immediate, serious risk of harm to people, you should use the local police phone number to report bad drivers, not the emergency service.

        A couple years ago I saw a drunk driver slam into a curb and jump his car about 5 feet in the air at around 2:00 AM. I called the local police and had absolutely no trouble getting through to dispatch. It was not

    • I could see the courts giving him some leniency if he was 12, but at 43 years of age

      wrong is wrong. if a 12 year old did this, it is just as much damage. hey, just a few days ago a court sent to prison a 13 year old who killed his grandparents because zoloft made him flip out. if a 13 year old gets nailed while on a doctor prescribed drug, who is going to give a 12 year old a break who is in their right state of mind?

      i think what would be interesting is laws that punish parents for what thier kids do. b

      • If you're 12 it might seem like a prank, and you don't want to ruin the kid's life but hit him hard enough that he realizes that what he did is dead serious and never thinks of doing it again. He certainly deserves to be punished, but not as severely as a 43 year old who should be capable of fully understanding the consequences of his actions.

      • Actually, they sent a 15 year old to prison. He was 12 when he knowingly killed his grandparents because they scolded him. He knew what he did was wrong and stole their car (after burning down the house) and tried to run away.

        I think your idea for laws to punish parents is good. The mother won't be 'out on the street', she'd be in jail, or whatever. The kid should end up in Juvi (or however the short version of it is spelled). The remaining children can either go to family or be taken into custody by

    • Re:Hope he gets slammed (Score:5, Funny)

      by isomeme ( 177414 ) <cdberry@gmail.com> on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:55PM (#11705115) Journal
      No, even though both remaining WebTV boxes were infected.
    • The guy was screwing with WebTV customers. I think we should elect him King of the World.

  • Gah? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by tomstdenis ( 446163 ) <tomstdenis@gma[ ]com ['il.' in gap]> on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:38PM (#11704876) Homepage
    "It still unclear what motivated this 43-year-old to launch such a bizarre worm."

    What? Mean and stupid doesn't cover it?

    It's like asking why that person cut you off in traffic endangering the lives of a half-dozen others... cuz their mean and stupid. It's not some huge racist or plot ...

    The guy probably thought he was hot shit writing a virus [instead of something productive like an OSS project that could benefit others...] and released something destructive.

    The balance in me wants to say "for every good there is a bad" but fuck it. The dude's just plain mean and stupid.

    Tom

    • Re:Gah? (Score:4, Informative)

      by MustardMan ( 52102 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:42PM (#11704940)
      "It still unclear what motivated this 43-year-old to launch such a bizarre worm."

      What? Mean and stupid doesn't cover it?

      I hate to admit it, but I often entertain myself when extremely bored with yahoo chat rooms and the like. Without fail, the biggest idiot script kiddies in the room, running stupid booter programs they downloaded off the web, are adults. They run the gamut from 20s through the 50s. It's really sad to see supposed adults taking such glee in childish bullshit.
      • That's largely the reason I stick to things like usenet/im/slashdot for "online" activities. To me online chat [irc] and gaming is just too um "fucked up"...

        Like the sort of folk who can figure out a 12 member clan, organize meetings, tourneys and the like but can't string 8 words properly on a resume to get a job...Let's not get into the "boom!! headshot!" crowd though...

        It's nothing impressive to write a worm. Let's see

        1. Program that cna send email [not hard]
        2. Program that does bad [not hard]
        3.
        • Where exactly is the challenge?

          Do you think if it was more challenging to do this, it would have a more "cool" factor making it okay?

          • Re:Gah? (Score:5, Informative)

            by tomstdenis ( 446163 ) <tomstdenis@gma[ ]com ['il.' in gap]> on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:53PM (#11705088) Homepage
            That's not my point. Making a bomb and not killing yourself is hard enough. I don't think that's good either.

            The point is they think they g0t m4dz zk111z for writing some virus. When in reality a virus [specially for win32 users] isn't that hard to get out there.

            So maybe if they realize that if they want to show off "mad skillz" they should just do something more productive cuz at least then they can brag about it and get mad job that pays mad money so they can have mad good toys.

            Think about it.

            Even if a virus WAS hard to write ... what you're gonna go to your next employer and go "you know the power outlet of August 2005? That was me!" ... yeah total model employee...

            And you could kiss government jobs goodbye too. In Canada for instance they get the RCMP to do a background check and shit so they know your life story.

            In no way is it a smart thing todo and all it does is cause others harm. Hence Stupid and Mean.

            Tom
            • ... "power outage..."

              Stupid brain no worky... but you get the point already so shuddup :-)

            • Your comments imply that getting a job is a big motivation. Maybe it is for some people, while for others it is not. In any case, sadly, having written such a virus would probably be good resume fodder for a security consultant. Lots of people buy into the whole "evil hacker turned to good" stereotype.

              I've known people who played around with writing worms and viruses, mostly as harmless proof of concept code, running in a sequestered environment. Most of them did it, just to see if they could, and as a

            • Stop suffixing every post with "tom". It pisses us off. We don't care what your name is. Really.
            • And you could kiss government jobs goodbye too.

              Heh, if only that were true. Maybe they check more thoroughly after 9/11, but some time a few decades ago, my dad landed a civilian government job in some military office while he was wanted for something or other relating to his more dubious anti-nuclear protest activities. (He was a bit of a radical hippie.) They fired him when he didn't show up to work one day. Of course, the reason he didn't show up was because the US Marshals had finally caught up with h

    • Re:Gah? (Score:5, Funny)

      by 99BottlesOfBeerInMyF ( 813746 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:43PM (#11704951)

      It's not some huge racist or plot

      I'm glad it's not some huge racist. I met this 6 foot 3, Nazi skinhead one time, and man was he a huge pain.

      • Brain not work goodly.

        I meant to write "some huge racist or other motiviating" something

        basically I meant "he didn't have an elaborate agenda". Let's see

        1. Be prick
        2. Be mean prick

        That's about as deep as the common virus writer gets.

        Tom
    • This sounds like he was using the +++ATH0 exploit to dial the numbers, if the text "+++ATH0" appears in a single IP datagram sent to a modem user, then the modem will hang up. He probabably just followed the "+++ATH0" with "ATDT911". If I remember correctly, due to the size of a datagram, he would not have been able to use a full 7 digit number.

      See also:
      http://www.attrition.org/security/denial/w/mod-at h .dos.html [attrition.org]

      From: Pete Gonzalez gonz@JEFFERSON.ML.ORG
      To: BUGTRAQ@netspace.org
      Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1998

  • The motivation for this? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Stevyn ( 691306 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:38PM (#11704879)
    None. He's just a dick. This isn't a cool hack or anything meaningful in computer science. It's taking an exploit of some type and messing with people's lives. Those operators on the other end and the police who are dispatched shouldn't be wasting their time with this nonsense.

    Why do these people think that causing damage through an exploit is anything but stupid? It's not clever since they don't even find the exploits, they just use them.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 )
      Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • Could it have been a mistake? I mean maybe he just wanted to see if he could do it, then it got out of hand. Could have been something as simple as I wonder if I could get webTV to dial a number. To be honest picking 911 was stupid. 411, or an 800 number might have been funny.
    • "None. He's just a dick."

      None is not an answer to that question, and dick is broad, relative, and just plain stupid. Maybe he is a "dick", but that does not clear up a complicated issue such as creating such a coordinated attack. There is obviously some sort of motivation behind something as direct as attacking 911 call centers. Although unreasonable as it sounds to a normal person, he himself did it for some reason. Please do not waste our time with such quick thoughtless posts.

      Were you motivated to

    • Re:The motivation for this? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by _xeno_ ( 155264 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @06:35PM (#11705577) Homepage Journal

      Some people are just griefers in real life. You know the type online, I'm sure. Well, some people are simply like that in reality. They just like destroying things and making other people unhappy.

      I think there was a good Calvin and Hobbes strip that kind of explains it, where Calvin explains that the best way to get rid of a bad mood is to give it to someone else.

      Same basic idea - some people feel happy by making other people miserable.

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:38PM (#11704882)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • I think it was actually due to the size of IP datagrams, if you do a google search for the "+++ATH0 exploit" you can find more information, I dont think that "+++ATDT5551212" would fit in a datagram.

  • hehe (Score:5, Funny)

    by Turn-X Alphonse ( 789240 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:38PM (#11704884) Journal
    wow, can you say get out of your parents basement and get a girlfri....

    Sorry wait, this is slashdot.

  • Motive is quite simple (Score:5, Funny)

    by 7Ghent ( 115876 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:38PM (#11704886) Homepage
    ..to see if he could.

    That's what virus writing used to be all about. Darn kids and their spam n' such. Why in MY day we wrote virii for the pure joy of destruction and chaos!

  • You'd seriously think... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Bonker ( 243350 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:38PM (#11704890)
    ... That only a WebTV user would be naive enough to open an attachment like that.

    Sadly, I've found that the great majority of people I know apparently have the intelligence of a WebTV user.

    This either means that even rudimentary computer security is far too complex for the average person, or that I need to get some new friends.
    • This either means that even rudimentary computer security is far too complex for the average person, or that I need to get some new friends.

      Neither. People are stupid. The end.

  • In other news (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:39PM (#11704898)
    People from Louisiana can use a computer! Who'd have thought it!!

    8)

  • DoS (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Guanix ( 16477 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:40PM (#11704905) Homepage
    Perhaps he wanted to create a Denial of Service attack against the 911 system.

  • Hmmm (Score:3, Funny)

    by dfn5 ( 524972 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:40PM (#11704910) Journal
    I guess the "Microsoft let me do it" defense didn't work. He should've tried Chewy defense.

  • 21 recipients=Worm outbreak? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by lottameez ( 816335 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:41PM (#11704920)
    According to TFA, only 21 people actually received this thing. I've cause more damage most days just driving to work.

    Next on slashdot: Bill Gates picks nose, AGAIN! Film at 11.
    • So, more than 21 people need to call 911 when you drive to work? Are you that bad at driving?
    • And those 21 actually received it directly from the writer--he emailed it to them! AFAIK there was no mechanism for replication, save for a WebTV subscriber sending the attachment to his friend as a favor.
      "Hey Cletus, this is supposed to change your WebTV screen colors! Didn't work on mine, but give it a try! Um, I'll talk to you later- someone's at my front door..."
      Yeah, NOT a worm...
    • Next on slashdot: Bill Gates picks nose, AGAIN! Film at 11.


      I doubt it. I'm pretty sure that he hires people to pick his nose for him.
    • We're not talking about DDOS'ing Akamai here -- I would imagine 21 dialers is enough to bring down a local 911 center.

      If he _had_ succeeded in spreading this thing nationwide (plus whatever countries use '911' as their emergency number and support WebTV) I'd propose sending the idiot to Abu Ghraib.

  • (CHIP) Unit (Score:3, Funny)

    by PMJ2kx ( 828679 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:41PM (#11704929) Journal
    If they ever have a reality TV show based on this, I hope they won't call Eric Estrada and tell him "CHiP's" is being remade...

    CHIP unit? Never heard of it.

  • Email Friends Virus - Get Busted! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by dukeluke ( 712001 ) * <dukeluke16.hotmail@com> on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:44PM (#11704966) Journal
    ROTFL - seriously, if you're going to email your 25 closest friends - shouldn't you first make sure your virus doesn't directly involve the police coming to their door? Granted, it might be considered a funny prank - but at least make sure you can't be traced as easily as the from: 'Best Friend in Louisianna'.

  • If only... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Facekhan ( 445017 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:45PM (#11704980)
    He had reprogramed them to dial romanian sex chat numbers he would have been invited to join the Direct Marketing Association.

  • He got his name on Slashdot (Score:5, Funny)

    by Peter Cooper ( 660482 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @05:45PM (#11704981) Homepage Journal
    Hey, it was one way of getting his name on Slashdot. Come on, how many of us lowly cretins here in the comments section have ever been referred to by our full names in a Slashdot post? Yeah, I can count all two of you out there. The guy's a douchebag, but, by jove, he's a famous douchebag!
  • Metairie is the old suburb adjoining New Orleans. Jeansonne was probably possessed at the time he wrote the worm.

  • One thing is clear. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Facekhan ( 445017 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @06:01PM (#11705182)
    A prank done to annoy people results in a much greater sentence than a thousand petty crimes done for profit under a corporate banner.
    • Making prank calls to 911 is both stupid and dangerous. I somehow doubt if you'd be so inclined to dismiss it as a "prank" if you were unable to get through to 911 while one of your loved ones were having a heart attack because some schmuck sent out a virus that tied up the lines.

      This is something that richly deserves jail time. Your "corporate crimes" comment is pretty nonsensical.

  • In the UK (Score:3, Funny)

    by Skiron ( 735617 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @06:12PM (#11705313)
    When the worm hit the UK, the tape answer machine overheated "You have dialled an incorrect number... you have dialled an incorrect number... you have dialled an inco.....Pppppppppppppppppp"
    • What exactly does that mean? If you dial '911' in the UK, do you get called back by someone saying "You have dialled an incorrect number"? That's awfully strange.
      • Not called back, but you would get a recording saying the number wasn't recognized (I haven't actually tested this mind you). All regular area codes start 0, so if you started with 911 it would wait for the rest of the (presumably local) number. In the end it would give up and tell you to redial.

        The emergency number there is 999, or 112 (the european standard).
    • You should test that really. The person on the other end actually says "What service do you require?". 999 or 911 it makes no difference here.

  • Heh (Score:2, Funny)

    by imemyself ( 757318 )
    A few years ago with an old mini-laptop type thing(Windows CE 3), I was trying to get it to dial in to my ISP. I was messing with the dial options(like dial 9 before a #, etc), and didn't notice that it would be dialing like 1-911-#... So, when I dialed I could hear the 911 person, but since I had no mic, I had to hang up and let them call me back. Definately one of those "Oh shit" moments.
  • How does this have anything to do with my rights online?
  • It still unclear what motivated this 43-year-old to launch such a bizarre worm.

    He's an asshole?

  • Reason (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    It still unclear what motivated this 43-year-old to launch such a bizarre worm.

    Like he's going to pull some great reason out of his ass. What could he possibly say that would make reasonable people say "Ohhh! No wonder!"?

  • Some details (Score:5, Informative)

    by Trailwalker ( 648636 ) on Thursday February 17, 2005 @07:55PM (#11706361)
    WebTv has its own alt.discuss news groups. The associations formed by WebTv users in them are very intense.

    One extremely egotistical type generated a great deal of dislike, if not outright hate. Jeansonne was part of this individual's clique. The actual "exploit" is very simple to do and well known. Jeansonne was just the first person to combine the requisite amount of vindictiveness and stupidity to actually do this. Almost all WebTv users have html signitures that rival web pages in their complexity. A simple
    <embed>
    webtv-trick://reset-phone "911"
    </embed>

    was all that was necessary.

    Having the police arrived unexpectedly at their door was very unsettling for the mostly female recipients of the email. Some were accused of making the calls on their own and threatened with arrest for missusing the 911 system.

    This was not a virus, but a direct personal attack against the victims of the email.

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