More than half (57%) of small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) and enterprises across the META region listed the need for special expertise among their top reasons for engaging third-party security specialists in 2021.
According to the Kaspersky annual IT Security Economics report, other commonly listed top reasons among both groups include meeting compliance requirements (SMB: 57%; enterprise: 56%) and efficiency in delivering cybersecurity solutions (SMB: 43%; enterprise: 66%).
To help IT security workers reach that highly sought-after professional level, Kaspersky has expanded its online training portfolio with the Advanced Malware Analysis Techniques course for established reverse engineers, incident responders, and digital forensic specialists.
In 2020, businesses were forced to accelerate their digital transformation by months, or even years, resulting in the rapid increase of complex IT infrastructure and related security risks.
In combination with the shortage of cybersecurity specialists and a lack of capacity to develop talent internally, this situation has compelled companies to look for external support.
Kaspersky’s global research, conducted among IT business security decision-makers, shows that companies are turning to outsourcing of certain functions to gain expert help. In 2021, specialist expertise has surpassed even financial effectiveness as the main reason to bring in third-party services for business globally and locally across the META region.
Additionally, last year, enterprises mainly outsourced IT security because of the added efficiency they provided in delivering security solutions (66%), while SMBs were guided by shortages of expert skills inside the organisation (80%) and financial considerations (60%).
Improving defenses (40%) and the level of specialist security expertise (39%) are expected to dominate IT security budget expenditure for all sizes of business – and were listed as the main drivers for increasing business spending on cybersecurity.