Foreign Secretary William Hague claims the UK is fending off attacks by cyber criminals every hour of the day.
Hague made the claim during an interview with the Daily Telegraph .
The publication also quoted figures from intelligence sources who claim Britain is targeted by 1,000 cyber attacks every hour.
"There are attacks made every hour and the losses can be great," said Hague.
I see evidence every day of deliberate, organised attacks in the UK from cyber criminals.
"I see evidence every day of deliberate, organised attacks against intellectual property and government networks in the UK from cyber criminals...with the potential to undermine our security and economic competitiveness."
Hague's comments have been warmly welcomed by Jay Huff, EMEA marketing director at HP Enterprise Security, who described cyber crime as one of the "greatest challenges" of our time.
"By putting in place the right thorough procedures, business[es] can act early to stave off the multitude of threats they are facing," added Huff.
Meanwhile, Terry Greer-King, UK managing director of security vendor Check Point, said Britain is under "constant threat" from malware and Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks.
"In order to mitigate the severity of attacks or even block them before they cause widespread damage, organisations need to collaborate and share intelligence with each other to track emerging threats and avoid costly cyber attacks in the future," advised Greer-King.
