COUNTY WEB ADDRESSES HIJACKED.

Byline: Michelle Rester Staff Writer

Los Angeles County officials are on the hunt for a person from the United Kingdom who hijacked 65,000 of the county's Web addresses and used them to send pornographic material and junk e-mail, as well as in hacking attempts.

It was a man from England who works for a security company that discovered the crime - but not until the hijacker tried to hack into his company's firewall, county officials said.

No harm has come to the county during the scam, but an investigation is under way to find the cyber-thief.

``It's not exactly identity theft, but in this case, someone did steal our identity and was using it for their own purposes,'' said Mark Gascoigne, general manager of the information technology services division of the Internal Services Department. ``But we never would have known had somebody not told us.''

Gascoigne said the addresses - hijacked between April 3 and May 1 - were part of a block of addresses the county had purchased, registered and set aside until needed.

They were to be used internally for employees and county departments and not accessible by the public.

Michelle Rester, [phone], Ext. 2127

michelle.rester(at)sgvn.com