Last week, an 18-year-old student, Sven Jaschan, was arrested at his home in Germany for creating the Sasser computer worm, which recently spread untold havoc around the world by causing computers to continually reboot when accessing the Internet. Sven’s excuse? He wanted to be famous.

This is the guy we’ve been looking for? Not a madman? Not Ted Kaczynski? Not a crazy genius holed up in a mountain shack in Montana? Just an 18-year-old kid who is normal enough to want celebrity status, but doesn’t know the difference between famous and infamous? What a disappointment this must be for the computer cops. They were looking for Hitler, and they found Bart Simpson. No crazed look in his eye. No axe to grind. And though the news accounts didn’t mention it, I’ll wager he’s never even taken the postal exam.

Sven Jaschan is by most accounts a regular guy. A little shy maybe, but not the malicious type, according to friends. Reports on his arrest are still sketchy, but it seems that Sven had bragged to fellow students about his secret worm-writing exploits, partially because he wanted their admiration and partially because he has the judgment of an average 18-year-old. [Author's note: Readers of this column who, through no fault of their own, happen to be 18-years-old are obviously of high caliber and impeccable character, and can consider themselves excepted.] Secret or no secret, Sven’s fellow students understand that a $250,000 reward check from Microsoft will keep you supplied with warm beer and gummy bears for a very long time. No translation necessary. They’ll even take it in American dollars, thank you.

In Germany, students go to school through the ninth grade, then either get on the college-prep track (white collar) or go to trade school (blue collar). Sven recently graduated from trade school, where (surprise!) he shined as an information technology student. In fact, one professor thinks that a reason he created the Sasser worm was to drum up business for his mother’s fledgling PC security company. So, by at least one account, that makes him a decent son as well.

Not that Sven’s mother was in on the malice. According to her, “about four months ago “Sven was over here for a visit and said ‘Papa, I’ve put out a computer worm.’ And then my husband said ‘Sven, you didn’t do anything stupid, did you?’ He just kind of laughed nervously.”

Anything stupid? Hmmm. What 18-year-old boy hasn’t heard that question before? Of course, with most of us, it meant we were caught spying on the girls’ locker room; with Sven, it means wreaking billions of dollars in damage on computers in every corner of the globe.

The good news is that Sven is going away for a very long time and Sasser won’t be bothering you anymore. If you’ve already been hit, you can find relief at http://www.microsoft.com/security/incident/sasser.asp. The bad news is that the reward money is coming out of Microsoft’s pool of money, which I can’t help but think affects my own personal bottom line. Just how much of the $250,000 is coming out of my pocket, I can’t say. But, seeing as how I have no choice in the matter, I have to believe it’s worth it.

So to those German students who turned Sven in, let me be the first to say Danke Schon. This weekend, go ahead and order an extra beer. It’s on me, whether I like it or not. (Sigh.)