March 5, 2014 - Financial services firms are far more likely to fall victim to cybercrime than their counterparts in other industries, according to a survey from PwC.

Of 1330 financial services firm respondents from 79 countries, 45% say that they have fallen victim to economic crime during the survey period, compared to just 34% across all other industries quizzed.

While asset misappropriation continues to be the main threat, 39% of those that have suffered from economic crime say they have been hit by cybercrime, compared to just 17% across other industries.

However, PwC thinks that 39% is "alarmingly low" and that its experience suggests that a clear majority of FS firms, especially retail banks, have been hit by cybercrooks.

In its report, the firm says that while some threats have decreased over the last year - for instance the DDoS attacks on bank Web sites emanating from the Middle East in 2012 - there has been no abatement in hits on IT infrastructure.

PwC points to America's failure to embrace chip and PIN as an invitation to crooks, a subject which has been gaining airtime since the massive Target data breach.

Despite high profile attacks and increased regulatory efforts around the world to drive cybercrime up the agenda, PwC says that banks are surprisingly blasé about the threats. Just 41% of respondents believe that they will experience cybercrime in the next two years, although more than half think that the threat is increasing.

"There is a sense that FS organisations still fail to see the importance of establishing fundamental IT security objectives and linking those with business objectives and risks," says the report.