More than 46 million signals of potential cyber-attacks are seen on average every single day across the world, according to new data released by BT.

The company currently logs more than 530 signals of potential attack per second as they guard their global networks against an army of malicious actors seeking to exploit vulnerabilities – targeting businesses and critical national infrastructure.

With businesses of every size going digital, the most targeted industries in the past 12 months are IT, defence, banking and insurance – a fifth (19.7%) of malware sightings are directed towards these high-stakes targets.

The retail, hospitality and education sectors are also at high risk, account for 14.9% of malware sightings in the past 12 months.

Criminals often capitalise on seasonal sales and spikes in online traffic, which makes the approaching festive period a particular worry for retailers.

Small businesses, startups and charities are also finding themselves in the firing line; approximately 785,000 cyber-crimes were found across UK charities just in the last year. These less traditional targets may not have the security tools in place to protect them, but also tend to harbour sensitive data from more vulnerable individuals.

The BT data shows that every 30 seconds cyber-criminals scan any device connected to the internet looking for weaknesses, using automation and machine learning to identify vulnerabilities in business defences – the digital equivalent of a burglar looking for an open window.

All of this means that the average business will have its network scanned and tested by cyber-criminals over 3,000 times each day.

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These figures become particularly concerning when well over half of businesses (61%) in the UK say that keeping up with cybersecurity measures is becoming increasingly difficult, according to BT’s global cybersecurity research from May.

This is compounded by the challenge of keeping the whole organisation aware of the threats, with one in four (26%) businesses saying that this is their biggest pain point.

Tris Morgan, managing director, security at BT, commented: “The volume of cyberthreats in the UK is rising at an alarming rate, so it’s really concerning that so many businesses and public services are leaving themselves open to attack.

“The fabric of the modern business has changed, and there’s now more connected tech for hackers to exploit, more valuable data to target and a bigger prize at stake if they make it through.”