‘I fell into it’: ex-criminal hackers urge Manchester pupils to use web skills for good

Ricky Handschumacher, who served four years in prison for a crypto heist, said he would have taken a different path had he known that you could be ‘paid a lot of money to do the right thing’. Photograph: Gary Calton/The Guardian

Cybercriminals, the shadowy online figures often depicted in Hollywood movies as hooded villains capable of wiping millions of pounds off the value of businesses at a keystroke, are not usually known for their candour.

But in a sixth-form college in Manchester this week, two former hackers gave the young people gathered an honest appraisal of what living a life of internet crime really looks like.