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According to reports by French media, authorities have arrested 22 people suspected of running an international hacking gang.

The arrests were made in Paris and southern and northern France by a team of 90 policemen.

Authorities have been following the activities of this gang for the past four months as they came to know about it after they bragged about their activities on a web forum. All members are said to be under 25 years of age, with one reported to be only 13 years old. It is alleged that they that broke into business networks in France and overseas.

If found guilty they face a maximum of five years in jail for destroying data and degrading network performance at the affected companies. Only seven firms have lodged a formal complaint against these hackers although some 34 businesses in France, Iceland and Russia were affected by their activities.

According to Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos:

One of the disturbing facts about this story is that 16 of the 22 people arrested are under 18 years old. While the authorities must be applauded for investigating cases like this, we should also question what is going wrong with our education of young people to make them think that computer hacking might be an acceptable way to behave. More has to be done to teach children in school how to use their computer skills responsibly.