IT contractors could find themselves called upon to defend people and businesses from ever-more sophisticated attacks, according to antivirus company Norton.

Research by Tufin Technologies recently found that 23 per cent of college and university students have hacked into IT systems, with nearly a third viewing hacking as "cool" and "easy".

Con Mallon, security expert at Norton, said businesses need to ensure that all employees are made aware of the risks surrounding them online.

"Cybercriminals have increasingly turned their attention towards enterprises due to the potential for monetary gain from compromised corporate information," he commented.

Mr Mallon went on to say that attackers have been making use of the abundance of personal information to be found on social networking sites to launch socially engineered attacks on individuals within companies.

The comments follow a warning from Student Finance England this month that students are increasingly being targeted by phishing emails.