Cybersecurity experts enjoy 15% salary bump as demand soars

Some professionals can earn up to $200,000 per month.

Banks and financial institutions are shoring up demand for cybersecurity professionals in Singapore, pushing up salaries for certain roles by up to 15% on average in the last year alone.

Recruitment firm Astbury Marsden says that malware analysts, security compliance and threat intelligence experts are among the highest paid security professionals.

Malware analysts can now earn $135,000 per year on average, up from $119,500 last year – a 13% increase. Security compliance and threat intelligence experts, meanwhile, can now earn up to $200,000 per annum, subject to supply and demand.

Penetration testers, who test IT systems for security weaknesses that hackers could breach, saw the biggest proportional annual pay rises at 14.3%, and now earn an average of $86,000 per annum, up from $75,200 last year.

The report noted that demand for penetration testers is particularly marked, especially across in-house teams at financial services firms, with many now keen to cut the delays and costs involved with turning to a consultancy when a cyber-attack or leak takes place.

“As the risk of cyber threats increases, both in prevalence and sophistication, the availability of sufficiently skilled cyber security professionals is lagging behind. Pay levels are surging as a result– a trend which looks set to continue over the next couple of years at least,” said Sandip Kotecha, Head of Technology at Astbury Marsden Asia-Pacific.

The report added that banks are typically prepared to pay higher salaries for professionals who are already highly skilled, while consultancies are willing to invest time and resources to upskill candidates, often via dedicated training labs.

“Banks need people with the requisite skills and detailed knowledge now, so they are enticing the most experienced talent with the lure of bigger pay packets. However, consultancies are using their capacity to train staff up as a real selling point to attract able candidates with the potential to succeed,” Kotecha noted