Property agents have been told they are now firmly in the crosshairs for cyber criminals as the number of attacks soar.

Real estate finance and insurance specialist, Karis Insurance, said its research has found last year has seen a 17% rise in cyber-attacks against UK property services businesses, with the number of attacks having risen to 208 in the year ended December 31 2025, up from 178 in the previous year.

Ravi Sejpal, director of Insurance at Karis Insurance says that property agents and BTL property managers are becoming more attractive targets for hackers, as they collect more personal data than ever before. Cybercriminals are also aware that their client lists also includes a high percentage of affluent and high net worth individuals.

Property agencies now routinely collect data from buyers, sellers, landlord and tenants including:

• passports and driving licences (for AML/KYC checks)
• proof of address
• bank account details
• mortgage information
• tenancy records

All of this data is valuable to hackers, either through ‘ransomware’ attacks, in which they lock the business out of its own data until they pay a ransom, or through identity theft of affected people, or simply by selling the data (e.g. bank details) on the dark web.

At further risk of data breaches is any information relating to property transactions. This data could allow hackers to undertake ‘payment diversion fraud’, in which they substitute their bank details for the seller’s in a property purchase.

Sejpal added: “In many cases, property businesses hold just as much detail about their client base as a bank would. However, there are very few businesses in the property sector who have bank-level data security arrangements.”

“The sort of personal data that property agencies hold about their clients could be hugely valuable if it fell into the wrong hands. These figures show that hackers are increasingly realising that.”

“The property industry has now reached a point where having specialist insurance for data breaches is critically important.”

“Every financial services business and law firm involved in property long ago understood the risks posed by hackers, which can be business-critical for those affected. The property industry itself hasn’t quite moved at the same pace in getting on top of the risks, however.”