Worm farmers The court in Sale, twin city to the Moroccan capital Rabat, convicted 19-year-old science student Farid Essebar (pictured left) and his friend Achraf Bahloul, 22, for their role in creating and spreading the Zotob worm last year.
Moroccan authorities said the two men had one accomplice in Turkey, who was named earlier by the FBI as Atilla Ekici. "
Zotob caused computer outages at more than 100 U.S. companies, including major media outlets like The New York Times. But it did not create widespread havoc like software programs such as SQL Slammer and MyDoom.
The FBI and Middle Eastern law enforcement agencies, at one point, worked together in an international manhunt, which at one point pegged as many as 16 suspects, according to the FBI.
The fact that there were so many suspects raised suspicions even further, as some security analysts warned of a kind of worm-writing war going on amongst members of the digital underground.
As it turned out, they were partly right: The two convicted writers did indeed want to show off for their friends and rivals. But they didn't do too great a job of it, as bugs in their own code actually prevents the payload from achieving its main objective to spread itself further.
CNN was among the many news agencies whose systems were affected by the spread of Zotob through the mail attachment, which did work. At one point, reporters in the network's own Atlanta headquarters were able to capture live images of their systems continually rebooting -- a product of the defective code -- without ever leaving the main studio.
The FBI said close teamwork with Microsoft and authorities in Morocco and Turkey helped net Essebar and Ekici 12 days after the attack.
The court sentenced Essebar and Bahloul to two years and one year in prison respectively. The two men's lawyers said they planned to lodge appeals soon.
Tags: Morocco Fes, Maghreb news
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