{"id":720287,"date":"2026-07-31T04:30:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-31T04:30:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/720287\/"},"modified":"2026-07-31T04:30:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-31T04:30:08","slug":"teen-hackers-tell-bbc-how-police-are-helping-them-use-their-skills-for-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/720287\/","title":{"rendered":"Teen hackers tell BBC how police are helping them use their skills for good"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">More than 1,150 cases have been referred to the National Crime Agency (NCA)&#8217;s Cyber Choices scheme in the last eight years &#8211; nearly 600 of those were in the last three years.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Authorities warn teenage hacking groups are playing an increasingly prominent role in serious cyber-attacks.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Young, English-speaking hackers have been linked to attacks on major organisations including Transport for London (TfL) and MGM Grand in 2024, and Marks and Spencer and the Co-op in 2025.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Individuals are also being increasingly targeted in hacks for their cryptocurrency holdings.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;It certainly has become more of a problem,&#8221; said Paul Foster, who leads cyber prevention work at the NCA.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;Certainly English-speaking, western world individuals that we know are now more active in cyber-crime.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">He said young people were engaged with online activity and devices at increasingly young ages exposing them to criminal communities and influences.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Police say many young offenders do not initially set out to become criminals. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Instead, they often begin by experimenting with technology, testing systems or trying to bypass restrictions before becoming drawn into online communities where hacking is encouraged.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"More than 1,150 cases have been referred to the National Crime Agency (NCA)&#8217;s Cyber Choices scheme in the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":720288,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[59,86,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-720287","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-technology","tag-gb","tag-technology","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/720287","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=720287"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/720287\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/720288"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=720287"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=720287"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=720287"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}