Who said that the Vietnam War was over? Not the computer boffins from the University of Bedfordshire.

The university's computer science and technology department took part in a study of computer security with consulting firm 7Safe.

And it found that more than a third of cyber-attacks on UK organisations – 36 per cent – are made from Vietnam.

The UK Security Breach Investigations Report, which was published last week, analysed data from more than 60 computer forensic investigations.

It was supported by the Government's law enforcement body the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA), and the Metropolitan Police's police central e-crime unit.

Professor Carsten Maple, the University of Bedfordshire's head of computer science and technology, said: "To my knowledge this report is the first of its kind in the UK, and many businesses will find the results very interesting.

"It has been a pleasure working with 7Safe."

After Vietnam the next most common source of cyber-attacks on British computers was the USA, which was responsible for 29 per cent of attacks.

Information on payment cards was stolen in 17 out of every 20 cases, or 85 per cent. But none of the organisations that suffered breaches of that nature were compliant with the PCI DSS security standard.

In 73 per cent of cases the attacks were described by the study as being "relatively unsophisticated".

Alan Phillips, the chief executive of 7Safe, co-authored the study.
He said; "Compared with many existing studies that are based purely on survey data, this reports reveals what is really happening in the UK.

"The work carried out by 7Safe's breach investigations team has been expertly analysed by Professor Maple and the results are intriguing."