The suspected author of the Anna Kournikova email virus faces up to six months in prison after being charged yesterday by Dutch police.
Jan de Wit, 20, is alleged to be OnTheFly, the name of the hacker who unleashed the Kournikova worm on unsuspecting email users all over the world in February.
Mr de Wit is scheduled to appear in court on September 12 on charges of spreading information over a computer network with the intention of causing damage. Under Dutch law he could receive a maximum of six months' imprisonment or a fine of 100,000 guilders (£29,000).
The email claimed to be a photograph of the tennis star and came with the message "Hi: Check This!", together with what appeared to be a picture file labelled "AnnaKournikova.jpg.vbs". Everyone who double clicked on the attachment triggered a worm virus that spread by sending itself to everyone in a Microsoft Outlook address book.
When the extent of the damage became clear, OnTheFly handed himself over to police in Sneek, northern Holland.
The Kournikova virus spread quickly, but it did not affect as many users as the "I love you" virus that paralysed the email servers of more than 100m users last year.
Soon after the attack, OnTheFly posted a justification of his actions on a Dutch website, saying he had sent the Kournikova email "just because I am a big fan of hers. She deserves some attention, doesn't she?"
He added: "I never wanted to harm the people who opened the attachment. But after all, it's their own fault they got infected."
Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant for Sophos Anti-Virus, said: "Virus writers should take this as a warning - the authorities are taking their activities more seriously and are prepared to take decisive action. If you don't want to end up in court, don't write and distribute viruses."
Related articles
15.02.2001: Hacker launched Anna bug 'as a warning'
14.02.2001: 'Anna' email virus wreaks havoc
26.02.2001: Kournikova came to stay - and bugged us all day long
Useful links
MessageLabs list of top 10 viruses
Sophos Anti-virus
Anna Kournikova fan site
