Government officials in the United States, Britain and elsewhere have issued warnings about the dangers of a newly remote workforce, while tech companies are seeing surges in requests to help secure out of office employees. Cisco noted that the number of requests for security support to support remote workforces have jumped 10-fold in the last few weeks.

Senior advisor with Cisco’s Duo Security Wendy Nather, warned that people who have never worked from home before are trying to do it and they are trying to do it at scale.

She said the sudden transition would mean more scope for mistakes, more strain on information technology staff, and more opportunity for cyber criminals hoping to trick employees into forking over their passwords.

Some researchers have found hackers masquerading as the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention in a bid to break into emails or swindle users out of bitcoin, while others have spotted hackers using a malicious virus-themed app to hijack Android phones.

Israeli company Check Point discovered suspected state backed hackers using a booby-trapped coronavirus update to try to break into an unidentified Mongolian government network.

On Friday, US cyber security officials released an advisory warning companies to update their Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) and be on guard against a surge of malicious emails aimed at an already disoriented workforce. On Tuesday, Britain’s National Cyber Security Centre issued a six page leaflet for businesses managing remote employees.

Many workers are moving their employers’ data from professionally managed corporate networks to home WiFi setups protected with basic passwords. Some organisations are loosening restrictions to allow employers to access work-critical information from their bedrooms or home offices.