Internetworkers: http://www.ibiblio.org/internetworkers/

["Michael D. Thomas" <mdthomas AT mindspring.com>]

Provocative hypothesis from Robert X. Cringley today...

<quote>

As the Worm Turns

Last week's column was abuzz with rumors that the Sobig worm caused the
Big Blackout. Today's hot scuttlebutt is that the infestation was
created by the Spam Cartel. One of the Cringe crew says three-fourths of
the infected messages coming into his network were from addresses found
on anti-spam blacklists. Sure, it sounds paranoid, but spammers may have
been propagating the worm deliberately. After all, machines infected
with Sobig could be used to send spam anonymously or launch denial of
service attacks, among other nasty tricks. Last week, several major spam
blacklist sites were shut down by a DoS (denial of service), and at
least one (relays.osirusoft.com) is permanently out of commission,
according to its owner. Just what we need: another reason to hate
spammers.

</quote>