UK Cybersecurity Statistics for 2025

As Dame Margeret Beckett, a member of the House of Lords recently put it: “The UK has the dubious distinction of being one of the world’s most cyber-attacked nations”.

Calculating exactly how many cyber attacks there are per country is extremely difficult (not least because many attacks go unnoticed).

But reliable cybersecurity sources estimate the UK is within the top five most targeted countries, coming in just after far more populous nations like the US, China, Russia and India. 

But before we start feeling too sorry for the Brits, data also shows the UK is the 8th biggest global source of cybercrime. 

In this article, we’ll round up the latest 2025 UK cybersecurity statistics to illustrate:

• The nature, size and types of cyber breaches in the UK
• The cost of cyber crime for the country’s victims
• Who the victims are (both organizations and private individuals)
• Key 2025 cyber breaches in the UK
• How the country is improving its posture
• The size and makeup of the UK cybersecurity industry

Key UK cybersecurity statistics for 2025

Here are the most significant UK cybersecurity statistics for the year so far:

• £300m ($404m) – estimated cost of 2025 cyber attack against retail chain M&S 
• 91% of universities experienced a breach, making them the most targeted kind of business
• 43% of businesses and 30% of charities experienced a cyber attack or breach
• Trends show cyber hygiene is improving (e.g. 62% of small businesses now have cyber insurance, up from 49% in 2024)
• Phishing is the most prevalent type of cybercrime (it was behind 93% of successful breaches against businesses)
• £1,970 – mean cost of a cyber crime to businesses
• Retail & manufacturing was the sector with most cyber incidents (~3,500)
• Individuals aged 75+ are most likely to report financial losses due to cyber crime

Overview of cyber security in the UK in 2025

The UK government’s annual Cyber Security Breaches Survey (CSBS) provides an invaluable source of data about cyber crime affecting businesses, charities and the education sector.

The survey, most recently published in June 2025, includes a representative sample of thousands of organizations across the country. 

Another useful source are the data security incident trends from the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). These provide a record of all cyber attacks and accidental breaches that have been reported to the authorities. 

Here are the key trends and insights from these – and other – sources. 

Cyber breaches by sector: education is most targeted

• Educational institutions are most targeted: 91% of universities, 85% of further education colleges and 60% of secondary schools faced a breach or attack.
• Four in 10 businesses targeted: 43% of businesses reported any kind of cyber security breach or attack – equivalent to 612,000 companies nationwide.

• Three in 10 charities targeted: The government survey found 30% of charities experienced a breach or cyber attack, equating to 61,000 organizations. 

Cyber crime by industry

The ICO’s data gives us figures for the raw number of breaches per sector. This shows that ‘retail & manufacturing’ businesses experienced the overall highest number of attacks. 

However, the CSBS data shows that ‘information or communications’ companies are the most affected by cyber crime – 43% of companies in this sector had a breach (of course, there are far fewer information and comms companies than retail businesses).

This was followed by admin or real estate (26%), professional, scientific or technical (25%), finance or insurance (24%) and utilities or production (23%). 

Organization size and cyber crime – slight downward trend

Medium and larger businesses in the UK are more likely to identify cyber attacks. In generally positive news, there was a slight downward trend on 2024 figures:

• 74% of large businesses identified a breach or attack in 2025, compared to 75% in 2024
• 67% of medium-sized businesses identified a breach or attack in 2025, compared to 70% in 2024
• 42% of small businesses identified a breach or attack in 2025, compared to 49% in 2024
• 35% of micro businesses identified a breach or attack in 2025, compared to 40% in 2024

Types of cyber crime in the UK in 2025

Out of the 43% of businesses and 30% of charities that experienced a cyber attack in 2025, there were some clear trends in the types of breach (note that many organizations experienced more than one type of attack):

• Phishing is most common: 93% of businesses and 95% of charities that experienced a cyber crime were hit by phishing attacks.
• Hacking came second: Overall, 8% of businesses and 17% of charities experienced hacking.
• Ransomware is third most common: 7% of businesses who were attacked experienced ransomware, but this was much less common among charities (just 0.5%).

About a third (31%) of organizations only identified one attack in the previous year, but a sizable minority became repeat victims. In total, almost a quarter of businesses were targeted between 11 and 99 times, and 8% experienced over 100 cyber crimes. 

Which types of cyber crime caused most damage?

While phishing appears to be the most common kind of cyber crime in the UK, it’s not necessarily the most impactful.

If an incident causes data loss, then this must be reported to the ICO. Their data suggests that ransomware attacks are the most prominent cause of more serious harms:

Cost of cyber breaches in the UK – 2025

While some of the UK’s biggest cyber breaches of 2025 have cost victims many millions of pounds, the hit for most businesses is normally much more manageable. 

According to the CSBS, the direct mean cost of cyber crimes (excluding phishing) is £1,970, while the median cost is £600.

Although this cost appears fairly low, these figures need to be interpreted. The government survey asks companies about direct costs of breaches.

But there are, of course, many other intangible expenses when a company experiences a cyber attack (time wasted, impact on productivity, the effects on customer confidence, etc.). 

The CSBS data also doesn’t include estimates for the costs of phishing, which is the most prevalent form of cyber crime.

While there may not be a direct cost for responding to phishing (the attacker may steal information or they may do nothing at all), the time and effort spent dealing with and investigating phishing attacks is viewed as extremely disruptive, according to follow-up CSBS interviews. 

Intangible effects of cyber breaches on UK businesses

Besides direct costs, cyber attacks also have serious impacts on business reputation and trust, according to a survey by insurer Hiscox in late 2024:

• 47% of companies found it harder to attract new customers following a cyber attack
• 43% lost customers due to an attack
• 38% experienced negative publicity following a breach
• 21% lost business partners

The CSBS survey, meanwhile, found that 7% of businesses temporarily lost access to files or networks, 6% saw web applications or services taken down, 3% had software corrupted or damaged, 2% had personal data altered or destroyed, and a further 2% had money stolen.

UK cybersecurity statistics: impacts on individuals

While businesses remain the primary target of cyber attacks, an analysis of UK crime survey data also reveals some insights into how private citizens are affected:

• People aged 25-44 reported the most cybercrimes (283), closely followed by the 45-64 age group (234 cyber crimes)
• However, people in the 75+ age group were most likely to experience financial losses when they became victims of cyber crime, whereas those aged 16-24 were least likely to lose money
• Males (7.74%) were more likely than females (6.95%) to be victims of cyber crime
• People in managerial and professional occupations (9.25%) were more likely to become victims of cybercrime than people in manual occupations (5.46%), students (8.29%) or those who were unemployed (3.04%)

Major cyber security events in the UK in 2025

This year has seen a number of serious cyber crime events in the UK. The largest or most impactful include:

Marks & Spencer: In April 2025, retail chain Marks & Spencer fell victim to a ransomware attack that caused website problems, issues with the company’s ordering and payment systems and saw some customer data stolen too.

In total, the attack was estimated to have cost the firm £300m. Similar but smaller attacks by the same group of hackers also affected retail firms Co-op and Harrods. In July 2025, four people were arrested on suspicion of involvement in the attacks. 

HMRC: In June 2025, the UK’s tax authority (HMRC) admitted that criminal gangs had used phishing to fraudulently extract tax repayments worth £47m (the fraud began in 2024, but was only publicly revealed in June 2025). 

Inflite The Jet Centre: In August 2025, this Ministry of Defense subcontractor suffered a cyber-security incident which meant that the details of almost 3,700 Afghan refugees in the UK were exposed. 

Positive trends visible in 2025 UK cybersecurity statistics

Although the UK still faces serious cyber threats, the statistics do show a generally positive trend in terms of crime and preparedness. 

Cyber incidents are becoming less impactful

In February 2025, the UK government published results from its latest annual longitudinal study (it tries to follow the same businesses over several years to learn about changes in their cyber posture). 

The data shows that, compared to the previous year:

• 10% had experienced website takeovers in 2024, compared to 15% the year before
• While 79% of businesses in the study experienced an incident in 2024, only a third said these cyber incidents were ‘impactful’, compared to 54% in 2023. 
• Only 12% said that cyber incidents stopped staff from carrying out day to day work, compared to 18% in 2023
• Only 21% said they required additional staff time to deal with incidents, compared to 34% in 2023

The UK’s cybersecurity statistics suggest cyber hygiene is improving

According the CSBS survey, organizations are generally implementing and following better cyber hygiene practices:

• 48% of SMBs have carried out a cyber risk assessment in 2025, compared to 41% in 2024
• 62% SMBs have cyber insurance in 2025, compared to 49% in 2024
• 53% of SMBs have cyber business continuity plans in 2025, compared to 44% in 2024
• Similar trends were also seen in medium and large businesses. 

There is also plenty of evidence that good cyber practices are widespread:

• 77% of businesses have updated malware protection
• 73% have password policies
• 72% have updated network firewalls
• 71% back up data securely via the cloud
• 68% have restricted admin rights

Cyber security is also viewed as a high priority by 72% of businesses, suggesting there’s serious engagement with the issue at most firms. 

But there are also areas to improve

While the picture is generally positive, there are some areas for concern:

• Charities tend to have weaker cyber hygiene than private businesses
• Only 40% of businesses are using two-factor authentication
• Only 19% of businesses provide staff training around cyber security

UK cyber security industry statistics

The UK is a major market for cyber security companies, and it has an enormous ecosystem of suppliers and service providers.

According to 2025 data from IPSOS:

• The UK’s cyber security industry generates £13.2 billion in revenue, with £7.8 billion gross value added
• The sector employs 67,300 people in the UK
• There are 213 large cyber security firms based in the UK, 353 medium, 397 small and 1,202 micro cyber businesses
• Most (59%) cyber security firms provide services, 26% sell security products, 12% are registered as MSSPs, and 3% are resellers

The most common cybersecurity offerings by UK firms are:

UK cybersecurity statistics demonstrate improvement – but more needed

The UK has the world’s sixth biggest GDP, a massive financial services sector and an open economy.

It is therefore unsurprising that it is also a major target for cyber criminals. 

As these 2025 UK cybersecurity statistics show, the country has a mixed record when it comes to protecting itself against cyber crime. 

On one hand, the UK experiences very high rates of cyber crime, and worryingly large numbers of organisations discover they’ve been breached every year.

On the other hand, there does seem to be a positive trend, where cyber attacks seem to be becoming less successful and less impactful.

This is surely thanks to the ever increasing use of advanced cybersecurity tools and gradually improving cyber hygiene. 

As a serious player in the UK’s cybersecurity industry, Heimdal is dedicated to helping public sector organisations like St George’s NHS Trust, private businesses like Waterstones, educational institutions like Park Community School or MSPs like 4Cambridge enhance their security. 

Want to learn more about how we can help your UK organisation protect itself against cyber threats? Contact us today for a demo.

Danny Mitchell