Cyber crime booms in 2004, from BBC
Interesting excerpts:
The count of known viruses broke the 100,000 barrier and the number of new viruses grew by more than 50%.
One of the biggest changes of 2004 was the waning influence of the boy hackers keen to make a name by writing a fast-spreading virus … 2004 saw a significant rise in criminal use of malicious programs. … This change in the ranks of virus writers could mean the end of the mass-mailing virus which attempts to spread by tricking people into opening infected attachments on e-mail messages.
The emergence of the first proper virus for mobile phones was also seen in 2004.
Also, this article uses the term “worm writers.” Isn’t that something from Dune?