RP hackers turning into syndicates

Fellow
Authorities have been monitoring certain e- groups or societies that could be behind big, transnational cyber crimes, and these suspects could be your tech-savvy neighbors or seatmates at an Internet café.
Online identity thieves, who used to prefer working alone, have in recent years begun organizing as criminal syndicates, usually in connivance with foreign hacker groups, according to Alex Ramos, a computer forensics specialist of the Philippine National Police.
They don't fit the typical profile of a criminal. They're not neglected. Some do it for the fun of hacking and earning a little something. There is also a group of crackers, college boys, who only focus on getting credit card information, Ramos says. Some members being enticed to join these societies are as young as 14 years old, he says.
Alex Ramos, a computer forensics specialist of the Philippine National Police.
One of the earliest monitoring of hackers' groups that Ramos conducted started in 1999 . It led to some minor arrests, but the core of the syndicate- run by foreigners, in turned out-was busted only in 2007.
It turned out, too, that the crime was affecting telecommunications networks worldwide, and would be the biggest to be thwarted by local authorities since the E-Commerce Law was passed in 2000.