Rather than being hacker central, China is the main target for online criminals, according to security experts at Microsoft.

Microsoft's latest assessment of threats and vulnerabilities reveals that attackers favor hiding malicious programs in seemingly innocent Web browser applications and that China is their preferred target. Malware protection center general manager Vinny Gullotto said that in the majority of exploits the local language is set to Chinese.

More than 47 percent of software "exploits" found stalking the Internet in the first half of 2008 were in Chinese, while 23 percent were in English, the second most common language for attack programs.

One of the reasons that developing countries are softer targets is because fledgling Internet users aren't savvy to tricks and traps used by hackers and online criminals.