Starting pay of £45k in cyber security boom

THE protection of information stored on computer systems has become increasingly important over the past 20 years as the world has moved to the internet, digital systems and smart devices.

With working from home becoming the norm for millions due to the pandemic, the importance of cyber security has spiralled.

Tasks such as updating apps and software, enabling two-factor authentication on emails and having different passwords for different accounts have become part of what is now a huge industry with huge potential financial rewards.

The East Midlands has become a hub for cyber security companies, and wages have risen over the past year to an average of around £68,000 and starting wages of over £45,000.

Adrian Smith, senior director of operations at recruiter Randstad said: “Cyber-security is a booming sector in the East Midlands as well as the North West of England, Yorkshire & the Humber, and London.

“The best cyber-security jobs are being created in the East Midlands and that’s unbalancing supply and demand, driving up pay.

“Last year, it was possible to recruit a less experienced cyber-security specialist for close to £47,000 in this area. That was great value for a role that is in such high demand – dynamic, agile companies have taken full advantage of what was a 20 per cent discount on hiring the same person in London. But the same sort of candidate in the same city, would be demanding £52,600 now.”

Cyber security specialists working in money-based industries, such as financial services, have seen average salaries rise from £70,800 per year to £71,300 per year.

But it remains a vital part of keeping companies safe from fraud and blackmail, with one Derby taxi firm recently being conned out of thousands by a fraudster who was later imprisoned.

The shift to cyber security in the region has come alongside the decline in bricks and mortar businesses, with several establishments moving to trading online permanently after the pandemic.

In March, Lindy Cameron, chief executive of the UK’S cyber-security agency, the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), said cyber-security was “still not taken as seriously as it should be” and was “simply not embedded into the UK’S boardroom thinking”. But the amount of vacancies being filled suggests most of the UK is catching up.

Mr Smith said: “There’s a greater need for cybersecurity people as more businesses put more of their operational emphasis on the virtual world. Bosses might have been trying to put hiring freezes in place over the last year but cyber-security is not an area that CEOS can afford to ignore. Salary rises in the East Midlands and Derby reflect that. Companies appreciate that they can’t ignore cyber-security.

“And employees working from home during the lockdowns made the job of keeping organisations’ IT infrastructure intact much harder.

“More than 50 per cent of decision makers in the IT community think remote workers will expose their organisation to the risk of a data breach.

“Remote working on a vast scale has been a major headache for IT security and that’s driven recruitment, especially in Derby.”