Myspace worm boy gets probation

A HACKER who unleashed the first self-propagating cross-site scripting worm has been banned from the internet, and sentenced to three years probation.

Samy Kamkar, 19, admitted charges stemming from his most infamous hacking on MySpace in October 2005. Kamkar also has to pay restitution to MySpace.

Kamkar used Asynchronous JavaScript and XML(AJAX) and was able to circumvent MySpace's strong JavaScript filters. According to his bog, his goal was to get around MySpace restrictions and get HTML to add cool "effects" to his page that other people couldn't. This was in the mistaken belief that it would "get him chicks" as "Girls want guys who have computer hacking skills."

The hack involved placing the string "but most of all, Samy is my hero" on each of his victims' profiles.

But the hack got a bit out of control. What he didn't realise was the hack was exponential and he affected millions of people's websites.

"I messed up, didn't I? I'm now more afraid and decide I am never doing anything even near illegal ever again," he wrote in his bog.

There is more about this, here. µ