A QUARTER of young people in England and Wales have downloaded music, films or software from the internet illegally, according to a government study published today.

Almost two thirds of them admitted committing the illegal act on more than three occasions, with young males more likely to take part in illegal web activity than women.

Three per cent of those aged 10 to 25 admitted visiting a website which told them how to commit a crime.

“Similar to other technology activities, males were more likely than females to report having visited these websites,” the British Crime Survey, commissioned for the Home Office, found. The results indicate that 27 per cent of households with the internet were affected by a computer virus in 2003-04, a significant leap from 18 per cent the year before.

The survey found that one in ten of those aged from 16 to 25 had been victims of mobile phone harassment.

Among 18 to 25 year olds, 16 per cent admitted falsifying work expenses and 10 per cent admitted insurance fraud. Four per cent of people with credit cards had been victims of card fraud.

The data also drew on the Home Office’s Offending, Crime and Justice survey, which polled 10,000 people aged 10 to 65 in England and Wales.

The British Crime Survey involved interviews with 42,000 people in England and Wales.

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