You’ve seen the high-level stats on the cybersecurity skills gap, but I’ll remind you of some of the main ones from the (ISC)2 Cybersecurity Workforce Study:

  • In the United States, the cybersecurity workforce gap is nearly 500,000.
  • The cybersecurity workforce needs to grow by 62% in order to meet the demands of U.S. businesses today.
  • The global cybersecurity workforce gap is estimated at 4.07 million, so the global workforce needs to grow by an estimated 145%.

As the gap persists, Tripwire continues to keep a pulse on how the skills gap issue is actually being felt by the security experts who are responsible for defending their organizations from cyber attacks every day. Partnering again with Dimensional Research, we surveyed 342 security professionals on how they are experiencing the skills gap and how they intend to address the issue going forward.

Cybersecurity Teams Under Pressure

Spoiler alert: our survey revealed that cybersecurity teams are feeling the pressure heavily going into 2020. According to Tripwire’s study, 83% of security experts feel more overworked going into 2020 than they did at the beginning of 2019. That’s easy to understand considering that 82% said their teams were understaffed. And it’s not for a lack of trying; it’s harder to find experienced staff with the right expertise. A large majority (85%) also said that it’s become more difficult over the past few years to hire skilled security professionals.

Skills Gap Cover 1

Tripwire’s Cybersecurity Skills Gap Report 2020 page 3

Tim Erlin, vice president of product management and strategy at Tripwire, is well aware of these cybersecurity staffing difficulties for organizations.

It’s getting harder and harder for organizations to fill open positions on their security teams. Larger organizations, which you might assume have more resources, are experiencing the skills gap issue even more acutely (Read more...)