Information Security Contract Job Trends

Information Security (InfoSec)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Information Security skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 19 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
19 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 164 137 98
Rank change year-on-year -27 -39 +23
Contract jobs citing Information Security 637 593 1,000
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.72% 1.88% 2.32%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 1.97% 2.12% 2.64%
Number of daily rates quoted 341 342 706
10th Percentile £363 £363 £400
25th Percentile £450 £496 £488
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £600 £575
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +4.35% -4.17%
75th Percentile £650 £675 £688
90th Percentile £775 £800 £775
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £575 £550
% change year-on-year -13.04% +4.55% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 73 21 52
10th Percentile £17.48 £15.34 £15.90
25th Percentile £20.71 £20.00 £33.48
Median hourly rate £33.50 £24.18 £49.50
Median % change year-on-year +38.54% -51.15% -23.85%
75th Percentile £45.00 £38.75 £83.40
90th Percentile £80.77 £48.57 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £33.50 £23.14 £50.00
% change year-on-year +44.80% -53.73% -23.37%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK

Information Security falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 32,398 27,994 37,832
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 87.63% 88.92% 87.58%
Number of daily rates quoted 20,495 16,988 25,007
10th Percentile £305 £307 £300
25th Percentile £406 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £613 £638 £645
90th Percentile £723 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -5.00% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,977 897 1,738
10th Percentile £14.52 £15.62 £14.02
25th Percentile £17.69 £20.94 £17.50
Median hourly rate £25.15 £32.50 £38.85
Median % change year-on-year -22.62% -16.34% +19.54%
75th Percentile £57.00 £62.50 £63.75
90th Percentile £69.25 £74.92 £75.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £24.00 £30.83 £40.28
% change year-on-year -22.15% -23.46% +54.90%

Information Security
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Information Security relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Information Security job vacancy trend in the UK

Information Security
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Information Security.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Information Security

Information Security
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Information Security over the 6 months to 19 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Information Security in the UK

Information Security
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Information Security.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Information Security

Information Security
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Information Security over the 6 months to 19 January 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Information Security in the UK

Information Security
Top 16 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Information Security within the UK over the 6 months to 19 January 2026. The 'Rank Change' column provides an indication of the change in demand within each location based on the same 6 month period last year.

Location Rank Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Matching
Contract
IT Job Ads
Median
Daily Rate
Past 6 Months
Median Daily Rate
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
England -23 570 £550 -8.33% 412
UK excluding London -22 300 £500 -13.04% 371
London -14 263 £575 -4.17% 97
Work from Home -2 186 £550 +1.15% 190
South East -22 90 £563 +0.90% 112
North of England -32 75 £476 -13.45% 82
North West -20 50 £475 -11.21% 46
Midlands -39 42 £403 -35.08% 54
South West -7 39 £506 -25.00% 48
East of England +4 35 £537 -10.58% 53
West Midlands -47 23 £403 -47.90% 24
Yorkshire -31 22 £477 -13.27% 27
East Midlands -10 19 £413 +37.50% 29
Scotland +7 14 £438 -8.28% 9
Wales 0 5 £388 - 14
North East -17 3 £550 -19.41% 9

Information Security
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities by Category

The following tables expand on the one above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. They cover the same employment type, locality and period, with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each category:

Application Platforms
1 24 (3.77%) SharePoint
2 15 (2.35%) Confluence
3 14 (2.20%) Microsoft Exchange
4 7 (1.10%) Mattermost
4 7 (1.10%) Skype for Business
5 6 (0.94%) IIS
6 4 (0.63%) Oracle Collaboration Suite
7 1 (0.16%) Apache
7 1 (0.16%) Apache Airflow
7 1 (0.16%) WebSphere
7 1 (0.16%) WebSphere Application Server
Applications
1 61 (9.58%) Microsoft Office
2 31 (4.87%) Microsoft Excel
3 16 (2.51%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 5 (0.78%) MS Visio
5 3 (0.47%) Microsoft Project
5 3 (0.47%) Navisworks
5 3 (0.47%) Revit
6 2 (0.31%) ProjectWise
Business Applications
1 15 (2.35%) Remedy ITSM
2 7 (1.10%) Oracle EBS
3 2 (0.31%) assyst
3 2 (0.31%) SAP GRC
3 2 (0.31%) Temenos T24
4 1 (0.16%) Salesforce CRM
4 1 (0.16%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 120 (18.84%) Azure
2 83 (13.03%) AWS
3 40 (6.28%) Microsoft 365
4 35 (5.49%) GCP
5 31 (4.87%) Entra ID
6 22 (3.45%) SaaS
7 21 (3.30%) Power Platform
8 11 (1.73%) Azure Sentinel
9 10 (1.57%) OCI
10 8 (1.26%) OneDrive
11 7 (1.10%) AWS CloudFormation
11 7 (1.10%) GitHub
11 7 (1.10%) Microsoft Purview
11 7 (1.10%) Power Automate
12 6 (0.94%) IaaS
12 6 (0.94%) PaaS
12 6 (0.94%) PowerApps
13 5 (0.78%) Azure DevOps
13 5 (0.78%) Cloud Computing
14 4 (0.63%) Amazon S3
Communications & Networking
1 68 (10.68%) Firewall
2 33 (5.18%) Network Security
3 23 (3.61%) DNS
4 22 (3.45%) TCP/IP
5 14 (2.20%) SSH
5 14 (2.20%) WAN
6 13 (2.04%) Wireless
7 12 (1.88%) DHCP
7 12 (1.88%) HTTP
8 11 (1.73%) Internet
9 8 (1.26%) Intrusion Detection
9 8 (1.26%) SMTP
9 8 (1.26%) VPN
9 8 (1.26%) Wi-Fi
10 7 (1.10%) Skype
10 7 (1.10%) SSL
11 6 (0.94%) FTP
12 5 (0.78%) LAN
13 4 (0.63%) NGFW
13 4 (0.63%) SAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 18 (2.83%) Power BI
2 10 (1.57%) Data Warehouse
3 6 (0.94%) SQL Server
4 5 (0.78%) GIS
5 4 (0.63%) Data Lake
5 4 (0.63%) SQL Server Reporting Services
6 3 (0.47%) Metadata
6 3 (0.47%) Tableau
7 2 (0.31%) Amazon RDS
7 2 (0.31%) Amazon Redshift
7 2 (0.31%) BigQuery
7 2 (0.31%) DB2
7 2 (0.31%) EDRMS
7 2 (0.31%) Electronic Patient Records
7 2 (0.31%) MongoDB
7 2 (0.31%) NoSQL
7 2 (0.31%) Power Query
7 2 (0.31%) Relational Database
8 1 (0.16%) Oracle Reports
8 1 (0.16%) QGIS
Development Applications
1 21 (3.30%) JIRA
2 13 (2.04%) Burp Suite
3 10 (1.57%) Metasploit
4 7 (1.10%) Git
4 7 (1.10%) Jenkins
5 3 (0.47%) Artifactory
6 2 (0.31%) Atlassian Bamboo
7 1 (0.16%) Balsamiq
7 1 (0.16%) GCC
7 1 (0.16%) GitLab
7 1 (0.16%) MSI
7 1 (0.16%) SonarQube
General
1 239 (37.52%) Social Skills
2 140 (21.98%) Finance
3 83 (13.03%) Analytical Skills
4 82 (12.87%) Public Sector
5 50 (7.85%) Legal
6 36 (5.65%) Banking
7 32 (5.02%) Organisational Skills
8 19 (2.98%) Presentation Skills
9 18 (2.83%) Manufacturing
10 14 (2.20%) Influencing Skills
10 14 (2.20%) Telecoms
11 13 (2.04%) Military
12 12 (1.88%) Documentation Skills
13 8 (1.26%) Law
13 8 (1.26%) Retail
14 7 (1.10%) Police
15 6 (0.94%) Investment Banking
15 6 (0.94%) Marketing
15 6 (0.94%) Spanish Language
16 5 (0.78%) Local Government
Job Titles
1 136 (21.35%) Analyst
2 58 (9.11%) Consultant
3 48 (7.54%) Architect
4 45 (7.06%) Security Analyst
5 42 (6.59%) Senior
6 41 (6.44%) Security Engineer
7 37 (5.81%) Security Manager
8 35 (5.49%) Support Analyst
9 32 (5.02%) Lead
9 32 (5.02%) Security Architect
10 25 (3.92%) Security Consultant
11 23 (3.61%) Security Officer
11 23 (3.61%) Security Specialist
12 18 (2.83%) Coordinator
12 18 (2.83%) Information Analyst
12 18 (2.83%) Information Security Analyst
13 17 (2.67%) IT Analyst
14 16 (2.51%) Cybersecurity Manager
15 15 (2.35%) IT Support
15 15 (2.35%) Security Advisor
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 11 (1.73%) OAuth
1 11 (1.73%) SailPoint
2 10 (1.57%) LDAP
3 9 (1.41%) Middleware
3 9 (1.41%) SAML
4 8 (1.26%) OpenID
5 7 (1.10%) OAuth2
5 7 (1.10%) Oracle Fusion
6 5 (0.78%) Qt
7 4 (0.63%) Spring
7 4 (0.63%) Spring Boot
8 3 (0.47%) .NET
8 3 (0.47%) ADO
8 3 (0.47%) Elastic Stack
8 3 (0.47%) J2EE
8 3 (0.47%) JSP
8 3 (0.47%) ModSecurity
8 3 (0.47%) REST
9 2 (0.31%) CSS
9 2 (0.31%) Flash
Miscellaneous
1 123 (19.31%) Management Information System
2 81 (12.72%) Security Posture
3 32 (5.02%) Cyber Threat
4 24 (3.77%) PKI
5 18 (2.83%) Onboarding
6 15 (2.35%) Data Centre
6 15 (2.35%) Security Operations Centre
7 14 (2.20%) Insider Threat
7 14 (2.20%) Operational Technology
8 13 (2.04%) Cloud Native
9 12 (1.88%) Data Protection Act
10 11 (1.73%) Analytical Mindset
10 11 (1.73%) Enterprise Software
10 11 (1.73%) Tandem
11 10 (1.57%) Greenfield Project
11 10 (1.57%) Product Ownership
12 9 (1.41%) CSOC
13 8 (1.26%) Mobile App
13 8 (1.26%) NHS
14 7 (1.10%) Driving Licence
Operating Systems
1 72 (11.30%) Windows
2 44 (6.91%) Linux
3 16 (2.51%) Windows Server
4 15 (2.35%) Unix
5 3 (0.47%) Kali Linux
5 3 (0.47%) Mac OS
5 3 (0.47%) Windows 10
5 3 (0.47%) zOS
6 1 (0.16%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 1 (0.16%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 220 (34.54%) Cybersecurity
2 159 (24.96%) Risk Management
3 119 (18.68%) Problem-Solving
4 104 (16.33%) Data Protection
5 103 (16.17%) Stakeholder Management
6 89 (13.97%) Incident Response
7 84 (13.19%) Continuous Improvement
8 77 (12.09%) Cloud Security
9 73 (11.46%) ITIL
10 66 (10.36%) Agile
11 61 (9.58%) Security Management
11 61 (9.58%) Security Operations
12 59 (9.26%) Stakeholder Engagement
13 56 (8.79%) Computer Science
13 56 (8.79%) SIEM
14 54 (8.48%) Threat Modelling
15 45 (7.06%) Incident Management
15 45 (7.06%) Regulatory Compliance
15 45 (7.06%) Roadmaps
16 43 (6.75%) Security Architecture
Programming Languages
1 52 (8.16%) Python
2 43 (6.75%) PowerShell
3 32 (5.02%) SQL
4 13 (2.04%) Java
5 9 (1.41%) Bash
6 5 (0.78%) C++
7 4 (0.63%) Kotlin
7 4 (0.63%) Kusto Query Language
8 3 (0.47%) Go
8 3 (0.47%) RPG
9 2 (0.31%) C#
9 2 (0.31%) Data Analysis Expressions
9 2 (0.31%) JavaScript
9 2 (0.31%) Perl
9 2 (0.31%) R
9 2 (0.31%) Rust
9 2 (0.31%) Solidity
10 1 (0.16%) Korn
10 1 (0.16%) T-SQL
10 1 (0.16%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 186 (29.20%) Security Cleared
2 135 (21.19%) SC Cleared
3 127 (19.94%) Degree
4 113 (17.74%) CISSP
5 84 (13.19%) CISM
6 50 (7.85%) DV Cleared
7 43 (6.75%) Computer Science Degree
8 33 (5.18%) CISA
9 26 (4.08%) Master's Degree
10 24 (3.77%) Cisco Certification
11 20 (3.14%) BPSS Clearance
11 20 (3.14%) ITIL Certification
12 19 (2.98%) CRISC
12 19 (2.98%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
13 17 (2.67%) (ISC)2 CCSP
14 16 (2.51%) ISO 27001 Lead Auditor
15 15 (2.35%) CCSP
16 13 (2.04%) Azure Certification
17 12 (1.88%) CREST Certified
17 12 (1.88%) Postgraduate
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 188 (29.51%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 146 (22.92%) NIST
3 103 (16.17%) GDPR
4 61 (9.58%) GRC
5 39 (6.12%) PCI DSS
6 27 (4.24%) Cyber Essentials
7 23 (3.61%) COBIT
8 21 (3.30%) NCSC
9 20 (3.14%) QA
10 19 (2.98%) PMO
11 15 (2.35%) Accessibility
11 15 (2.35%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 14 (2.20%) Def Stans
13 12 (1.88%) NIST 800
14 11 (1.73%) RMADS
15 10 (1.57%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
15 10 (1.57%) SLA
16 9 (1.41%) JSP 440
17 8 (1.26%) Data Quality
18 7 (1.10%) ISO/IEC 27005
System Software
1 53 (8.32%) Active Directory
2 15 (2.35%) Virtual Machines
3 10 (1.57%) Docker
4 4 (0.63%) VMware Infrastructure
5 1 (0.16%) BitLocker
5 1 (0.16%) Hyper-V
5 1 (0.16%) Microsoft App-V
5 1 (0.16%) Virtual Desktop
5 1 (0.16%) VMware Workstation
Systems Management
1 23 (3.61%) Microsoft Intune
2 16 (2.51%) Kubernetes
2 16 (2.51%) SCCM
3 15 (2.35%) HP SiteScope
3 15 (2.35%) SCOM
4 13 (2.04%) QRadar
4 13 (2.04%) Terraform
5 12 (1.88%) Ansible
6 11 (1.73%) Nmap
7 6 (0.94%) CASB
7 6 (0.94%) SCOrch
7 6 (0.94%) WSUS
8 5 (0.78%) Functional Safety
9 4 (0.63%) CSIRT
9 4 (0.63%) FortiGate
10 3 (0.47%) Grafana
10 3 (0.47%) Prometheus
11 2 (0.31%) EnCase
11 2 (0.31%) FTK
11 2 (0.31%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 132 (20.72%) Microsoft
2 27 (4.24%) Splunk
3 22 (3.45%) ServiceNow
4 21 (3.30%) Cisco
5 17 (2.67%) Google
5 17 (2.67%) Remedy
6 14 (2.20%) CyberArk
6 14 (2.20%) IBM
7 12 (1.88%) CrowdStrike
8 11 (1.73%) Fortinet
9 10 (1.57%) Oracle
9 10 (1.57%) Salesforce
10 9 (1.41%) Palo Alto
10 9 (1.41%) Thales
11 8 (1.26%) Gemalto
12 7 (1.10%) Databricks
12 7 (1.10%) Qualys
12 7 (1.10%) SAP
12 7 (1.10%) Sophos
13 5 (0.78%) VMware