[non-negative]viruses are very awesome pieces of art. it takes great skill to effectively find, reproduce and exploit vulnerable pieces of code. it is one reason why products are becoming very secure these days (except microsoft products, which will never become secure.)[/non-negative]

But out of a controlled environment and released into the wild represents malice. But, people who exploit code sometimes do it not for fun, but to prove to an unwilling company that they should secure and improve their products. (*cough*microsoft*cough*)

Sometimes it just takes a sasser virus to wake people up... others it may take total DDoS attacks by large botnets. But its very hard to wake up companies that can just barely protect themselves and their products enough to not be "out of the game" by large contracted companies who buy their products.

I personally have built programs to break into my own machines when i cannot access them due to a loss of a password (mainly root). (JTR is a good program for beginners).

In the end, it will only benefit you with better security for your computers locked doors (or windows ).