The country needs to be serious about cyber protection as the volume and sophistication of financially motivated cyber attacks has increased over the past six months, according to online security organisation CERT NZ.
The government agency helping organisations and individuals affected by cyber attacks said people need to become much more aware of the risks and take steps to protect their data and personal information.
"The Kiwi 'she'll be right' attitude won't cut the mustard anymore when it comes to cyber security," CERT NZ director Rob Pope said, adding the agency is getting about 1000 calls a month from victims of attacks.
"CERT NZ's incident data, and information provided by our global partners tells us that cyber attacks have become more sophisticated, persistent and harder to detect than ever before."