The arrest of a suspected hacker in England in connection with a cyber attack against a military website is welcome news. Computer users may sometimes feel under siege. Assaults by worms and viruses, with cataclysmic names like MyDoom or seemingly innocuous titles such as I Love You or Melissa, typically aim to gather confidential information, to disrupt user access or to compromise the security of data.

A report by the National Hi-Tech Crime Unit suggests that 83 per cent of UK companies have experienced computer crime, worth billions of pounds - 77 per cent from virus attacks, the rest from fraud, data theft and denial-of-service attacks.

UK insurance companies are paying attention to their American counterparts, with cover for computer damage in the US starting to be removed from commercial insurance plans.

By Bob Downes at The Scotsman.

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