Security Operations (SecOps)
UK

The following table provides summary statistics for permanent job vacancies with a requirement for Security Operations skills. Included is a benchmarking guide to the salaries offered in vacancies that have cited Security Operations over the 6 months to 28 November 2023 with a comparison to the same period in the previous 2 years.

6 months to
28 Nov 2023
Same period 2022 Same period 2021
Rank 270 302 408
Rank change year-on-year +32 +106 -86
Permanent jobs citing Security Operations 656 1,514 1,029
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 1.21% 1.21% 0.80%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 1.28% 1.26% 0.84%
Number of salaries quoted 460 965 688
10th Percentile £38,750 £41,250 £37,925
25th Percentile £51,250 £53,970 £49,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £64,500 £67,500 £65,000
Median % change year-on-year -4.44% +3.85% +10.17%
75th Percentile £75,000 £87,500 £80,000
90th Percentile £95,000 £106,250 £94,125
UK excluding London median annual salary £62,500 £62,500 £55,000
% change year-on-year - +13.64% +7.84%

All Process and Methodology Skills
UK

Security Operations is in the Processes and Methodologies category. The following table is for comparison with the above and provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 51,121 120,104 122,523
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 94.09% 95.72% 95.43%
Number of salaries quoted 36,956 73,203 81,032
10th Percentile £32,500 £34,313 £32,500
25th Percentile £43,750 £45,000 £42,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £60,000 £59,000
Median % change year-on-year - +1.69% +7.27%
75th Percentile £80,000 £81,250 £77,500
90th Percentile £98,750 £100,000 £95,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £52,500 £53,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -0.94% +6.00% +4.17%

Security Operations
Job Vacancy Trend

Job postings citing Security Operations as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised.

Job vacancy trend for Security Operations in the UK

Security Operations
Salary Trend

3-month moving average salary quoted in jobs citing Security Operations.

Salary trend for Security Operations in the UK

Security Operations
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing Security Operations over the 6 months to 28 November 2023.

Salary histogram for Security Operations in the UK

Security Operations
Top 17 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Security Operations within the UK over the 6 months to 28 November 2023. 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
Permanent
IT Job Ads
Median Salary
Past 6 Months
Median Salary
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
England +38 552 £62,500 -7.41% 219
UK excluding London +70 429 £62,500 - 152
Work from Home +66 291 £62,750 -7.04% 105
London +10 192 £67,500 -10.00% 82
South East +99 113 £65,000 +4.00% 31
North of England +34 104 £62,500 -3.85% 38
South West +64 63 £62,500 +6.54% 29
North West +35 60 £58,250 -10.38% 17
Midlands +105 48 £56,250 +2.27% 17
Wales +44 45 £55,000 +29.41% 5
Yorkshire +67 42 £62,500 +4.17% 17
West Midlands +94 37 £55,000 - 16
East of England +90 29 £60,000 - 21
Scotland -55 22 £65,000 -7.14% 13
East Midlands +48 11 £62,500 -12.76% 1
Northern Ireland +43 10 £37,500 -37.50% 1
North East +32 2 £66,500 +2.31% 4

Security Operations
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 10 (1.52%) SharePoint
2 2 (0.30%) MS Project Server
2 2 (0.30%) Oracle Workflow
2 2 (0.30%) WebLogic
3 1 (0.15%) IIS
3 1 (0.15%) MS Exchange
3 1 (0.15%) nginx
Applications
1 12 (1.83%) Microsoft Office
2 3 (0.46%) Microsoft Project
3 1 (0.15%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 1 (0.15%) Endur
Cloud Services
1 172 (26.22%) Azure
2 99 (15.09%) AWS
3 94 (14.33%) Microsoft 365
4 34 (5.18%) Azure Sentinel
5 28 (4.27%) SaaS
6 21 (3.20%) Entra ID
7 19 (2.90%) GCP
8 18 (2.74%) IaaS
9 7 (1.07%) Cloud Computing
10 5 (0.76%) Amazon ECS
10 5 (0.76%) PaaS
10 5 (0.76%) Serverless
11 4 (0.61%) GitHub
11 4 (0.61%) Mimecast
12 3 (0.46%) Amazon CloudWatch
12 3 (0.46%) Amazon EC2
12 3 (0.46%) Amazon S3
12 3 (0.46%) Azure DevOps
12 3 (0.46%) Azure Logic Apps
12 3 (0.46%) WhatsApp
Communications & Networking
1 179 (27.29%) Firewall
2 138 (21.04%) Intrusion Detection
3 109 (16.62%) Network Security
4 106 (16.16%) LAN
5 102 (15.55%) WAN
6 63 (9.60%) VPN
7 61 (9.30%) TCP/IP
8 44 (6.71%) Internet
9 41 (6.25%) HTTP
10 34 (5.18%) FTP
10 34 (5.18%) SMTP
10 34 (5.18%) Sourcefire
11 28 (4.27%) DNS
12 19 (2.90%) DHCP
13 16 (2.44%) Wireless
14 8 (1.22%) Cisco ASA
14 8 (1.22%) SAN
15 7 (1.07%) MPLS
15 7 (1.07%) NGFW
16 6 (0.91%) SNMP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 8 (1.22%) Big Data
2 2 (0.30%) Amazon RDS
2 2 (0.30%) Elasticsearch
2 2 (0.30%) MongoDB
2 2 (0.30%) Power BI
2 2 (0.30%) SQL Server
3 1 (0.15%) NoSQL
3 1 (0.15%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 4 (0.61%) Jenkins
2 3 (0.46%) Burp Suite
3 2 (0.30%) CircleCI
3 2 (0.30%) Git
3 2 (0.30%) GitLab
4 1 (0.15%) JIRA
4 1 (0.15%) Postman
4 1 (0.15%) SonarQube
4 1 (0.15%) Sonatype Nexus
4 1 (0.15%) TeamCity
General
1 217 (33.08%) Social Skills
2 96 (14.63%) Games
3 82 (12.50%) Finance
4 76 (11.59%) Analytical Skills
5 39 (5.95%) Law
6 35 (5.34%) Legal
7 21 (3.20%) Retail
8 20 (3.05%) Organisational Skills
9 17 (2.59%) Public Sector
10 16 (2.44%) Presentation Skills
11 13 (1.98%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 11 (1.68%) Banking
13 8 (1.22%) Aerospace
14 5 (0.76%) Local Government
14 5 (0.76%) Marketing
15 4 (0.61%) Telecoms
16 3 (0.46%) Manufacturing
16 3 (0.46%) Military
17 2 (0.30%) Advertising
17 2 (0.30%) Back Office
Job Titles
1 242 (36.89%) Analyst
2 154 (23.48%) Senior
3 151 (23.02%) Security Analyst
4 123 (18.75%) Security Manager
5 93 (14.18%) SOC Analyst
6 76 (11.59%) Security Engineer
7 69 (10.52%) Lead
8 64 (9.76%) Cybersecurity Analyst
8 64 (9.76%) Senior Manager
9 62 (9.45%) Business Manager
10 60 (9.15%) Senior Business Manager
11 52 (7.93%) Senior Analyst
12 34 (5.18%) Senior Security Analyst
13 32 (4.88%) Consultant
14 29 (4.42%) Cybersecurity Manager
14 29 (4.42%) Information Analyst
14 29 (4.42%) Information Security Analyst
15 28 (4.27%) Operations Analyst
16 27 (4.12%) Security Operations Analyst
17 26 (3.96%) IT Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 38 (5.79%) LDAP
2 7 (1.07%) Fluent Bit
3 5 (0.76%) Regular Expression
4 4 (0.61%) .NET
5 3 (0.46%) JSON
6 2 (0.30%) Hibernate
6 2 (0.30%) Java EE
6 2 (0.30%) Microsoft Graph
6 2 (0.30%) Spring
6 2 (0.30%) Web Services
7 1 (0.15%) .NET Core
7 1 (0.15%) 802.1X
7 1 (0.15%) Ajax
7 1 (0.15%) CSS
7 1 (0.15%) Elastic Stack
7 1 (0.15%) SailPoint
7 1 (0.15%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 250 (38.11%) Security Operations Centre
2 114 (17.38%) Management Information System
3 102 (15.55%) Cyber Threat
4 64 (9.76%) Security Posture
5 40 (6.10%) Cyberattack
6 39 (5.95%) Analytical Mindset
7 37 (5.64%) PKI
8 25 (3.81%) Cyber Kill Chain
9 23 (3.51%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
10 17 (2.59%) Operational Technology
11 15 (2.29%) Cyber Defence
11 15 (2.29%) Data Centre
12 13 (1.98%) CSOC
13 11 (1.68%) Cybercrime
13 11 (1.68%) Insider Threat
14 10 (1.52%) Onboarding
14 10 (1.52%) Self-Motivation
15 9 (1.37%) Data Protection Act
15 9 (1.37%) Product Ownership
16 8 (1.22%) Greenfield Project
Operating Systems
1 131 (19.97%) Windows
2 76 (11.59%) Unix
3 60 (9.15%) Linux
4 35 (5.34%) Windows Server
5 7 (1.07%) Windows Server 2019
6 4 (0.61%) Windows 10
6 4 (0.61%) Windows Server 2016
7 2 (0.30%) Android
7 2 (0.30%) Apple iOS
7 2 (0.30%) Mac OS X
8 1 (0.15%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 471 (71.80%) Cybersecurity
2 321 (48.93%) SIEM
3 241 (36.74%) Information Security
4 206 (31.40%) Incident Response
5 202 (30.79%) Vulnerability Management
6 116 (17.68%) Security Management
7 112 (17.07%) Incident Management
8 110 (16.77%) Cloud Security
9 99 (15.09%) Vulnerability Scanning
10 94 (14.33%) Data Loss Prevention
11 90 (13.72%) Threat Intelligence
12 84 (12.80%) Cyber Threat Intelligence
13 79 (12.04%) Risk Management
14 77 (11.74%) Impact Assessments
14 77 (11.74%) Kalman Filter
14 77 (11.74%) Vulnerability Remediation
15 73 (11.13%) Problem-Solving
16 69 (10.52%) Penetration Testing
17 68 (10.37%) Service Management
18 66 (10.06%) Business Continuity
Programming Languages
1 29 (4.42%) Python
2 25 (3.81%) PowerShell
3 18 (2.74%) Kusto Query Language
4 11 (1.68%) SQL
5 10 (1.52%) C#
6 9 (1.37%) Bash
7 4 (0.61%) Java
7 4 (0.61%) JavaScript
8 2 (0.30%) Go
8 2 (0.30%) Perl
8 2 (0.30%) Shell Script
9 1 (0.15%) R
9 1 (0.15%) Ruby
9 1 (0.15%) Rust
Qualifications
1 163 (24.85%) CISSP
2 123 (18.75%) Security Cleared
3 110 (16.77%) CISM
4 84 (12.80%) Degree
5 71 (10.82%) SC Cleared
6 65 (9.91%) SSCP
7 40 (6.10%) CompTIA Security+
8 33 (5.03%) Cisco Certification
9 27 (4.12%) (ISC)2 CCSP
9 27 (4.12%) CEH
9 27 (4.12%) GIAC
10 24 (3.66%) CCSP
11 23 (3.51%) Network+ Certification
12 17 (2.59%) CISA
13 16 (2.44%) DV Cleared
14 15 (2.29%) CompTIA CySA+
14 15 (2.29%) Master's Degree
15 12 (1.83%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
15 12 (1.83%) Computer Science Degree
15 12 (1.83%) DBS Check
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 173 (26.37%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 114 (17.38%) NIST
3 96 (14.63%) GDPR
4 50 (7.62%) Cyber Essentials
5 44 (6.71%) PCI DSS
6 23 (3.51%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
7 17 (2.59%) SLA
8 16 (2.44%) SOC 2
9 15 (2.29%) GRC
10 11 (1.68%) COBIT
10 11 (1.68%) NCSC
11 8 (1.22%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
12 5 (0.76%) QA
13 4 (0.61%) ISO/IEC 27005
13 4 (0.61%) NIST 800
14 3 (0.46%) Accessibility
14 3 (0.46%) HMG Security Policy Framework
15 2 (0.30%) ISO 22301
16 1 (0.15%) JSP 440
16 1 (0.15%) RMADS
System Software
1 57 (8.69%) Active Directory
2 17 (2.59%) VMware Infrastructure
3 14 (2.13%) Docker
4 5 (0.76%) Hyper-V
5 4 (0.61%) Firmware
6 2 (0.30%) Terminal Services
7 1 (0.15%) Snort
Systems Management
1 34 (5.18%) FortiGate
2 18 (2.74%) CASB
2 18 (2.74%) Kubernetes
3 16 (2.44%) Terraform
4 15 (2.29%) Nessus
5 14 (2.13%) Microsoft Intune
6 13 (1.98%) CSIRT
7 8 (1.22%) Ansible
7 8 (1.22%) Single Sign-On
8 7 (1.07%) Fluentd
8 7 (1.07%) logstash
9 6 (0.91%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 5 (0.76%) SCCM
10 5 (0.76%) WSUS
11 4 (0.61%) DatAdvantage
11 4 (0.61%) HP Fortify
11 4 (0.61%) SolarWinds Orion
12 3 (0.46%) QRadar
13 2 (0.30%) Host Intrusion Detection System
13 2 (0.30%) McAfee ePO
Vendors
1 149 (22.71%) Microsoft
2 69 (10.52%) Splunk
3 65 (9.91%) Cisco
4 36 (5.49%) CheckPoint
4 36 (5.49%) F5
5 34 (5.18%) ArcSight
5 34 (5.18%) Juniper
6 33 (5.03%) IBM
6 33 (5.03%) TippingPoint
6 33 (5.03%) Trend Micro
7 18 (2.74%) VMware
8 17 (2.59%) ServiceNow
9 12 (1.83%) Palo Alto
10 11 (1.68%) Intel
11 9 (1.37%) Oracle
12 8 (1.22%) Qualys
13 6 (0.91%) LogRhythm
13 6 (0.91%) SolarWinds
14 5 (0.76%) Varonis
14 5 (0.76%) Veeam