Cyberattacks--Who is responsible?

From the BBC today:

Cybersecurity: Ministers seek help from business

The government says it is planning "unprecedented co-operation" with the private sector to combat cybercrime.

Cabinet Office Minister Francis Maude said its Cyber Security Strategy would make the UK "one of the most secure places in the world to do business".

Data sharing between government and business on cyber threats will increase while a new unit within the MoD will look at cyber "military capabilities".

Cyber-attacks are ranked on a par with international terrorism as a threat.

Last year's national security strategy listed hostile computer attacks as one of four "tier-one" threats to the UK and ministers have set aside £650m of new money to better protect key infrastructure and defence assets from "cyber warfare".

Comment:

One of the interesting aspects of this article is that I have heard from several business owners that it's the Russian Mafia that is responsible for many hackings and cyber attacks.

In an online poll of a computer/hacking website, the 82% of users said the Russians were the best hackers.

If you google "Russians and hacking" numerous websites online declare that Russians and the Chinese are the greatest hackers and can also attack our utilities. Well, there is no profit in that. What most business owners are complaining of is theft of credit card information. While a small to medium business owner is best ceasing to store any credit card information on local computers, most consumers find this to be a horrid pain, typing in you address and complete credit card information with each purchase, it would seem that the local business could keep all credit card numbers, except the last 4, or the last 4 could be encoded with a hand kept code done by mathematical algorithm.