Kaspersky's latest report into cyber attacks has revealed that almost 30 million cyber-related crimes were launched in the last quarter of last year, with the majority being spread via browsers.
The most common types of attack were worms and file viruses delivered by exploiting vulnerabilities in browsers and extensions or plugins. Social engineering was another delivery method used by criminals to launch attacks.
More than 17.5 million Kaspersky customers were affected by local threats and 11.2 million of the total threats were caused by server vulnerabilities. The UK was sixth in the server-related cyber threat league table.
Victims of viruses were also targeted via offline methods. Although not as prevalent as "connected" attacks, malware was delivered using removable USB drives, CDs and DVDs.
Kaspersky used data collected from its users to uncover the frequency and methods of attempted attacks. It's said that its products and services detected and defended 12.1 million cyber threats against customers in the final quarter of 2018.
16% of its customers experienced attack attempts in the UK, which the company said puts the UK in 125th place when comparing how safe the country is for people browsing the internet. However, the company said it was able to protect against them all, demonstrating how important it is to have intelligent malware and security software running in businesses.
Kaspersky Labs still warned that businesses need to keep taking precautions to ensure their security is up to scratch.
"There's no such thing as 100% security, of course. But any organization that holds personal data has a duty of care to secure it effectively," the company said. "And where a breach results in the theft of personal information, companies should alert their customers in a timely manner, enabling them to take steps to limit the potential damage that can occur."
