Malicious programs for computers have been around for more than
20 years. It was the birth of the Internet which really enabled
these digital pests to make a breakthrough. Until now, gaming
consoles have been more or less immune to malware. Yes, there're
been Trojans for the Nintendo DS console
(Trojan.Nintendo.Taihen.a and .b) and for the Sony Portable
Playstation (Trojan.PSP.Brick.a) but the number of victims has
been small. This is because the user has to tweak the console in
order for so-called homebrew software (i.e. software not
certified by the console manufacturer) to run. There's a Linux
distribution available for the Sony Playstation 2 (which will
also be available for Playstation 3) which just cries out for
programming. However, any programs created will only run on
Playstations which have the distribution installed. Microsoft
recently announced that in future, users will be able to
purchase a development kit with a $99 a year registration fee -
no Linux here. Programs developed using the kit will