Topic: 12-year-olds behind cybercrime

[Clive]

A security firm has claimed that children as young as 12 are involved in cybercrime.

These young hackers are part of a developing underclass who "don't care" about revealing their identities, according to FaceTime.

FaceTime also said that attacks made on social networks had become more aggressive and are increasingly likely to be perpetrated by people among the target audience of the sites.

"Children as young as 12 years old are sharing professional phishing kits and trading stolen credit card details," said FaceTime's director of Malware Research Chris Boyd.

The targeting of social networks such as MySpace and Facebook is partially a result of their increasing popularity, according to FaceTime.

"MySpace and other social networking sites will continue to be the most popular target for hackers, phishers and spammers in 2008 as long as they continue to offer the same level of profile customisation to their users," Boyd said.


www.facetime.com
www.myspace.com
www.facebook.com

[Simon]

I can believe that quite easily!

[mistybear]

Shop lifting just got a whole lot easier, you don't even have to leave your bedroom.

[Reno]

It blows my mind how knowledgeable 12 year olds are these days. I guess i shouldn't be surprised. I would have experimented on a computer too if there would have been a computer to experiment on.

[Sandra]

Its not that long since that you were surprised at how us oldies were more clued up than you expected with PCs and various math and language problems Reno 

Maybe you are in that middle generation that missed out on something somewhere     

[Reno]

Its not that long since that you were surprised at how us oldies were more clued up than you expected with PCs and various math and language problems Reno 

Maybe you are in that middle generation that missed out on something somewhere     

Thats true for computer issues certainly, language issues maybe, math issues no. Around Texas it's rare to find someone over 40 who is knowledgeable about computers. Its rare but not as rare to find someone who knows a second language. I wasn't surprised at how good foreigners were in math though. I talked to a person here who was working on her masters in mathematics. She is originally from india. When she told me they taught calculus in highschool it completely blew my misconceptions about the level of foreign math skills.

[Sandra]

Who are you calling foreigners Reno 

Me and Hugh are British so its everyone else outside of the UK who is a foreigner 

What age do people range from and to in your high schools  ? We do 11 to 18.
I think we started calculus at 13 years of age, admittedly not at the same level you are currently doing from what we have discussed on messenger 

[Reno]

Slightly different point of view here in Texas. 

I think its 14-18 for highschool. When i was in highschool it was Algebra, Geometry, Algebra II and higher than algebra II was optional. Most people took trig or precal after algebra II for their senior year.

If i would have known what was in store in college I definitely would have taken at least trig in highschool. I remember a professor ranting about highschool calculus being more algebra with a little trig then actual calculus. Derivation and Integration are really handy simple little tools once you get them down. I don't see why they can't push the stuff earlier.

My only guess is that if they did they would have to supply tutors or extra resources to make sure students were getting the material. If they didn't parents would be complaining about nut being able to help there kids.

[Clive]

I talked to a person here who was working on her masters in mathematics. She is originally from india. When she told me they taught calculus in highschool it completely blew my misconceptions about the level of foreign math skills.

Asian Indians have long been the best mathematicians in the world Bob.

[Delgado]

Bring back good old fashioned discipline, and stop all this nonsense about "Cant slap Children".

A bloody good hiding will soon stop these little brats from messing with peoples computers!!!

   

[sam]

i started calculus at 14 (but I don't think it is needed for GCSEs - 16 for you foreigners!)... but then it was just really part of algebra, its all the same really - just ways to manipulate equations (can anyone tell I'm a physicist!)