The 'Malware Economy' Evolves

superglaze writes "ZDNet UK has a feature on how the malware economy is turning into a recognizable traditional IT economy. Leasing botnets? Malware support? Welcome to the new age of computing. As the piece suggests, it's all gone Darwinian. 'One indication of the maturity of the black economy, according to Telafici, was the recent case of a hacker who wrote a packer [software used to bypass antivirus protection], "threw in the towel recently as it wasn't profitable enough -- there's too much competition. They opened the source code and walked away."'"

Comments

Oblig..

[fizzer82]

Cracker not hacker!! ARRRGGHHHH OMFG the mainstream media is screwing us geeks over again.

There whining is covered, please continue with OT discussion...

Slaves, too

[Lepton68]

Not only will we love robots, they will be our slaves, too. Usable, abusable, ownable, perfectly legal. And no, the robots won't rise up and take over (for at least a few hundred years) even though they will be much, much smarter than us, because they will be made to appear to like their roles, be loyal, and understand that they are expendable and disposable, and they will legally remain property to do with as we will. Though they will be human-like, they will be easily and visibly distinguishable from humans by some indelible, obvious markings, such as bluish skin. Even so, there will be incidents, crimes and regrettable accidents, where humans will be mistaken for robots and abused or killed. This is not a fiction I'm spinning, but a prediction.

moderation for fun & profit

[damn_registrars]

I'm enjoying watching my comment get moderated up and down. As of this message, it has been moderated at least 4 times.

• Starting score = 1 (I passed on the karma bonus)
• +1 Informative -> Score = 2
• +1 Informative -> Score = 3
• -1 Overrated -> Score = 2
• +1 Informative -> Score = 3