Sask. man denies illegal computer use

A northern Saskatchewan man accused of crashing an internet chat room service in the U.S. says he didn't do it.

Facing charges is Ryan Lee, 19, of Denare Beach, a village of about 785 people located some 20 kilometres west of the Manitoba-Saskatchewan border.

He's scheduled to be in court in Creighton, Sask., on Sept. 14 on charges of mischief, illegal use of a computer and possession of a device to commit a computer offence.

In a news release last week, the RCMP said the chat room of a commercial website in New York City was shut down for several days earlier this year in a "denial-of-service" attack. Such an attack is an attempt to prevent legitimate users from accessing information or services, often by flooding a network.

Police said they traced the incident to Denare Beach, searched the house Lee and his family live in, and seized several computers. However, Lee told CBC News he simply doesn't have the technical ability to do what police said he did.

"I don't have any college degree or anything like that," Lee said. "I don't have the knowledge to do something like that."

The commercial website in New York complained to police in May, the RCMP said.

Lee said he was working in a computer store in Flin Flon, Man., at the time.

Although he had heard of the chat room that was involved in the computer attack, he had never used it, he said.

"I think that my computer was infected by viruses and somebody basically used my IP or my identity to do it," he said.

An IP or internet protocol address is the unique number that identifies every computer connected to the Internet.

Neither the police nor Lee would identify which New York company is alleged to have had its chat room attacked.