There’s one news story that everyone in the IT security world is talking about today: Julie Amero, a Connecticut substitute teacher convicted in January of allowing her students to see pornography on a class computer, was granted a new trial. (That’s just an expression. Some people, I’m sure are also talking about IBM acquiring Watchfire).

A number of security experts came to her aid in the past half-year, showing that this was a case of badware instead of a bad teacher.

While no one is jumping for joy just yet, there’s definitely a well-deserved sense of accomplishment on some information security blogs.

And I’d specifically like to point out Sunbelt Software’s blog, which has full coverage of the event.

“As you can image, I’m very pleased at the outcome of Julie Amero’s sentencing today. However there’s still the specter of a new trial, and so the show isn’t over yet. This event was a testament to the power of a community of people coming together in a common cause. One day, perhaps someone will write a story of this experience. It’s certainly been one of the more amazing events in my career.”
- Alex Eckelberry, Sunbelt Software blog

“As expected, the judge presiding over the Julie Amero trial has decided a new trial is the way forward. This would suggest the whole thing is going to be then speedily dismissed. It also possibly means that those who screwed up the first time round don’t have to stand accountable for their actions, but oh well…The important thing to remember here is that someone’s life was pretty much destroyed because of some spyware and adware – infection files that (let’s not forget) were pretty low down on the “danger scale,” yet still managed to stir up the biggest s***storm I’ve seen in some time.”
- paperghost, Vitalsecurity.org