NatWest faces 100 million cyber attacks every month, MSPs told
Experts set out the ‘staggering’ scale of digital crime to Holyrood’s Criminal Justice Committee on Wednesday.
NatWest faces 100 million cyber attacks attempting to breach its defences every month, MSPs have been told, as experts set out the “staggering” scale of digital crime.
The bank also blocks around a third of emails coming into its system, Holyrood’s Criminal Justice Committee heard.
Police and cyber crime agencies are increasingly dealing with fraudsters operating online, with gold scams and romance fraud becoming particularly prominent.
The trend increased sharply during the pandemic – in 2020 Police Scotland recorded 7,710 cyber crimes, but in 2024 that increased to 18,280.
Chris Ulliott, head of cybersecurity at NatWest, told the committee on Wednesday: “We analyse every single email coming into our estate, looking for malicious content.
“About a third of the emails, millions a month, we actually block because they are believed to be the start of an attack against our staff.
“If I look outside our network at the attacks that are probing our estate, we’re averaging about 100 million attacks per month just trying to break past the defences we have in the organisation”.
He said this has led to a cybersecurity team with hundreds of staff and a budget of millions.
Mr Ulliott said there is growing concern about fraudsters using artificial intelligence (AI) to make their approaches to people seem more credible.
The technology could even be used to alter a fraudster’s appearance in a real-time online call to look like an “elderly British gent” to gain trust with a victim.
Mr Ulliott said Scattered Spider, the group which may have been behind the recent attack on Marks & Spencer, is likely a loose international group in their teens and 20s who are sharing ideas on online forums.
SNP MSP Rona Mackay said the numbers revealed by the NatWest official were “absolutely staggering”.
Police Scotland Assistant Chief Constable Stuart Houston said law enforcement agencies around the world are collaborating to try and catch cyber criminals, with the FBI sharing intelligence on fraud and ransomware groups.
Adam Stachura from the charity Age Scotland said many elderly people are not confident users of online technology.
He said the impact of cyber crime can be devastating for the elderly, saying: “It can create financial destitution – that hit to confidence and self-worth.”
David Keenan, chief information officer at Arnold Clark, discussed the serious cyber attack which crippled the car company’s network at the end of 2022.
He said recovery was a months-long effort and the attack came despite the company having 12 staff dedicated to cybersecurity.
The SNP’s Ben Macpherson said cyber crime is “the criminal justice issue of our time”.
He said cyber criminals had even impersonated himself in order to contact constituents in Edinburgh Northern and Leith.
