UK small businesses are at risk of 65,000 cyber security attacks daily - with around 4,500 of these being successful - according to a new report by recruiter Robert Walters and data provider Vacancysoft, which claimed that the cost of data breaches is around £2.48 million per instance.

Nearly half of consumers (44 per cent) have stated that they would stop using a company online if they were to be breached during a cyber attack.

Darius Goodarzi, principal for information security and IT risk at Robert Walters, commented: “For e-commerce, the pace at which the sector grew during COVID-19 raises questions as to whether their cyber security has been up to par with the sharp increase in traffic to online sites.

“With consumers being hyper-sensitive about their personal information in a rapidly evolving digital world, e-commerce sites cannot afford to lose the trust of customers in what is becoming a very competitive space.”

Figures from Robert Walters' suggested that cyber security job vacancies within the consumer goods and services sector increased by 17 per cent in the last year.

The research also found that a lack of preparedness for the shift to remote working during lockdown has caused problems for many businesses.

Where just 11 per cent of UK businesses stated their entire workforce - at the same time - were able to work remotely pre-lockdown, this rose to 70 per cent once isolation measures were mandated in March.

Of the 70 per cent who were able to do this under seven days, over half (53 per cent) of these firms in the UK were able to transition their staff to remote working in less than 48 hours.

Despite having little notice, 71 per cent of staff described the relocation to home working as seamless. However, half of companies (48 per cent) admitted that they did not have adequate cyber security provision to maintain a 100 per cent remote working model.

Nathan Tittensor, director at data protection consultancy i3Secure, said: “After e-commerce, the next industry which we suspect will be looking at their security posture is the legal sector – in particular law firms.

"Whilst the legal sector deals with high volumes of confidential information, they have never been mandated to have certifications around security," he continued, adding: "it is remote working that has really shone a spotlight on the sector and they should act fast before it is faced with the consequences of personal information being mishandled when not on-site in offices.”

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