Technology experts are suggesting that cyber crime got "easier" in 2007 thanks to advancements in criminal infrastructures for staging malicious attacks.

The BBC reported that black-market industries supporting these practices are now so advanced that services such as virus-writing and spam dissemination are effectively available for rent or hire.

In addition to the growing frequency and immunity of such attacks, experts have also voiced concerns over the speed and professionalism with which subversive elements adapt to bypass new security measures.

Joe Telafici, vice president of operations for McAfee Avert Labs, said that malware is increasingly driven my money and the clientele willing to pay for such services range widely from professional criminal gangs to opportunistic web site owners looking to drum up traffic.

"There's a real eco-system built around this," he told the BBC. "2007 was a fairly interesting year - cyber crime continued to fuel most of the security attacks we saw."

Research for Connect in 2007 found that 88 per cent of UK businesses were interested in Disaster Recovery systems primarily to protect their critical applications and data.