The Minnesota mastermind behind a variant of the Blaster worm will not have to think about ponying up $500,000 restitution to Microsoft for infecting 48,000 computers with his version of the e-mail pest.
Jeffrey Lee Parson will perform 225 hours of community service in addition to his year and a half behind bars and an earlier order for 100 hours of community service, under a new legal agreement signed by the Redmond, Washington, software emperors and Parsons.
The agreement awaits only a judge's signature in federal court in Seattle. "Mr. Parson's additional community service will have a stronger impact on him in serving his sentence," said Microsoft senior attorney Tim Cranton in an e-mail statement.
Parson pleaded guilty in 2004 to creating the Blaster B variant, which hit computers in 2003 and targeted those at Microsoft in particular, using the variant to access 50 computers he used to launch an attack on 48,000 more machines.
