Why do people start computer viruses???

Question

I have heard people say profit before but where does the profit come from???

Answer 1

At one time viruses, spyware and other malware were mostly written by script-kiddies (mostly pimply-faced male adolesents) as a form of vandalism.

These days are unfortunately long gone.

Today it's all about making money.

For example a website that somehow "gave" you an unwanted toolbar, would earn a small commission.

But a simple toolbar is reletively benign. The big money is made in compromising thousands of computers and putting them into a single "botnet" These nets of zombie computers contain tremendous computing power and can be used to extort money from legitimate web-sites using a distrubuted denial of service attack.

Much of the spam that clogs our inboxes also is sent from these zombie machines, thousands per hour per machine and the actual owner of the computer is blissfully unaware of the fact. But the attacker and controller of the botnet makes a great living selling his underground e-mail server service on the black market!

Of course, since a fully compromised computer gives the attacker TOTAL control over it, it becomes trival task to mine these computers for bank account numbers, passwords, credit account numbers, identities, social security #s, etc.

And the list goes on and on.

Perhaps Eugene Kaspersky, founder of anti-virus maker Kaspersky Labs said it best, " It's a different world today. 10 years ago, we were fighting against smart kids who hacked as a hobby. Now, we're dealing with criminal gangs that control your computer to make money. Different world, different protections."
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2074772,00.asp?kc=EWEWEMNL121806EP24A

The golden days when malware was just a simple annoyance are over. :-(

Surf safely. And practice safe hex!

Answer 2

2

Answer 3

I read all the answers and even if jibbarjabar's sound more complete I have to add few things:

A) There are 3 kind of people who wrote viruses:
cyber hooligans

1.kids or young programmers, who did it to show off their skills in programming,

2. New programmers that made a concious decision to write viruses for cyber hooliganism, like hooligans do in real life. (some people use rocks and chains to harm people), these use viruses.
And internet gave them a large area an d new opportunities.

3. Proffesionals: These are the most dangerous and most wanted people from the "cyber police".
They wrote viruses for profit, and they are talented and excellent programers. They have their own close community and sell their services to companies.

4.The so called "Researchers". Proffesional programers,some of them may work on antivirus companies, but never spread a virus to make harm. They just make viruses to test antivirus programs, or to by-pass antivirus programs with only in mind to imporove these programs.

B) There are viruses that make actually no harm in a system. They just use a system "hole" to display a message. These viruses usually write from people that want to show off their skills.

And as Kaspersky Labs say, the 90% of viruses wrote from proffesionals, people who make money of them.

see WHY AND WHO make viruses in this article:

http://www.viruslist.com/en/viruses/encyclopedia?chapter=153280553

and viruses history here:

http://www.viruslist.com/en/viruses/encyclopedia?chapter=153280684

Answer 4

There are a number of fairly obvious reasons:

1. It is a modern form of graffiti. One gets to see the trouble they have caused in a public forum on an electronic medium.

2. Distaste or dissatisfaction against a group or company.

3. Just to see if they can.

4. Because they can.

5. Simply due to the fact that one has no moral compass and is willing to disrupt the lives of many. Simply put, the person is bad.

Answer 5

Different people, different reasons. For money, notoriety (whether, in just a group of friends, locally, nationally, or internationally), power, fun, boredom, harrassment of an individual, or as part of other hacking exploits, these are all fairly common reasons. I'm sure there are other reasons for people creating them as well.

Edit: Many virii are smaller parts of larger hacking schemes. One example: a keylogger virus is spread around that transmits, your username and password over the net to a server somewhere. It gets back to the hacker, who uses that information to manually get into your computer and search for personal information (name, address, credit card numbers, etc; they are probably on your computer somewhere), so he can steal your identity.

Just one of many ways a virus can be used...

Answer 6

most hackers come from third world or ex-communist countries where highly talented computer geniuses are not paid any more than a bus driver.
They know how to use a computer, have always wanted to program, but realize that they will never be paid for a legitimate job.
So, they turn to crime, and try to get "revenge" against the rich countries that these turds think are holding them back.

Answer 7

sometimes, just to be vindictive (ex-employee of some company wanting to crash the system) but a lot of times these days, the viruses are used to gather personal information so the virus creator can use it for "theft of identity" and create their own false identity, procuring credit cards and the like for their own personal and illegal benefit.

Answer 8

Every hacker has their own reason, weather the reason is to hack girls webcam or steal credit cards, some make ones to distroy computers of people they dont like, some make ones to make pop-ups to advertise companys that give them money.

Answer 9

Some do it as a joke (See Elk Clone virus), others do it to be mean, or for profit.

Answer 10

They are Pitiful Little People. They are Weak. It makes Them Feel Big to Harm Other Peoples Things.