AVG report unveils malware written by children

The latest AVG Community Powered Threat Report has revealed that children are increasingly writing malicious software.
The report dealt with the specific case of an 11-year-old Canadian child who had written a piece of software that supposedly added money to a selected Runescape account. However, once the user had entered their log-in details, they were simply forwarded on to the malware writer.
“We have now seen a number of examples of very young individuals writing malware, including an 11-year-old from Canada. The code usually takes the form of a basic Trojan written using the .NET framework, which is easy to learn for beginners and simple to deploy via a link in an email or posted on a social media page,” said AVG’s chief technology officer, Yuval Ben-Itzhak.
“We believe these junior programmers are motivated mainly by the thrill of outwitting their peers, rather than financial gain, but it is nevertheless a disturbing and increasing trend. It is also logical to assume that at least some of those responsible will be tempted to experiment with much more serious cyber-crimes.”

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