Dutch police say they have lured almost 9,500 youngsters into thinking they were getting involved in cybercrime as part of an awareness campaign over the past few days.

The youngsters were encouraged by a vlogger, game platform IGN and website Scholieren.nl to either hack an Instagram account, steal game money or buy a DDoS attack on their school to beat exam stress.

But when they clicked on the relevant link, they were confronted with the police campaign, pointing out they were one click away from committing a crime.

In total, the lures were seen 500,000 times and 9,456 youngsters clicked on the relevant link.

The aim of the campaign is not only to make youngsters aware of the risks but to make the issue a topic of conversation. One third of the youngsters who followed the link said they were unaware that what they were considering doing was a criminal offence.