Herefordshire Council is the second most affected authority in the UK to suffer cyber security incidents in the last five years, new figures have revealed.

The figures come from a freedom of information request by civil liberties group Big Brother Watch that asked 395 local authorities how many cyber attacks to council computer systems had taken place.

Herefordshire Council suffered 22 cyber security incidents between 2013 and 2017, second only to Tonbridge and Malling Borough Council whose IT systems were affected 62 times.

Big Brother Watch found that UK local authorities have experienced more than 98 million cyber attacks over those five years.

This equates to at least 37 attempted breaches of UK local authorities every minute and at least one in four councils experienced a cyber security incident – that is, an actual security breach – during that period.

Jennifer Krueckeberg, lead researcher at Big Brother Watch, said: “Local authorities are being targeted by a huge number of cyber-attacks on a daily basis. However, many still seem to think that this is solely an IT-issue.

“Councils need to urgently adapt adequate strategies in order to fulfil their duty to protect citizens’ sensitive and personal information.”

A Herefordshire Council spokesperson said the report highlighted how effective the authority is in identifying and reporting any cyber security threats.

They said: “Herefordshire Council takes cyber security extremely seriously to protect the personal data it holds.

“These reported cyber security incidents were suspected malicious emails received by staff who alerted the IT department.

“In each case, the machines were isolated and the suspected email was removed without causing a wider impact.

“Herefordshire Council remains vigilant in the fight against cybercrime; our staff are provided with annual training to help them identify and escalate any areas of risk relating to cyber security and our technology systems, alongside high-level security standards, help us to enforce strict information management.”