Slashdot Mirror
Profile of the Mind of a Virus Writer
zdburke writes "Clive Thompson, writing for the NY Times, has profiled several young computer virus writers around the world. A young Austrian wrote a Batch Trojan Generator which has simple options for constructing your next virus: fomat drive C? Overwrite every file? It's very well written by an author who clearly knows his stuff."
As to the issue of punishing minors as adults, I will accept this only at such time as the legally defined as adults. To deny a person of youth the franchise as a full citizen because he is too young, ignorant and immature, but hold him responsible, without the proper rights and benfits of full citizenship and representation, because he "is old enough to know the difference between right and wrong" is hypocritical, unjust and undemocratic.
in some cases, it is warranted. Consider this 'kid':
Steals his first car at 14
Minor crack posession at 15
A couple of muggings at 16
Armed robbery at a liquor store at 17
Fathers a couple of kids along the way.
His parents haven't seen him for a year and a half. He spends several periods in juvenile detenion along the way.
Finally, at 17 1/2, he mugs and beats an old woman, and she dies as a result.
Would you consider him still a 'child', simply because he is a few months away from the magic age of 18?