US is short nearly 530,000 skilled cybersecurity staff, says new study
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Despite recent high-profile tech industry layoffs, demand for cybersecurity professionals remains high, according to the latest data from CyberSeek. The total number of employed cybersecurity workers held fairly steady in 2022 at around 1.1 million, while the number of online job postings edged down to 755,743 from 769,736 in the 12-month period ending in December 2022, according to data from the cybersecurity workforce analytics site developed in partnership by the National Initiative for Cybersecurity Education at National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), CompTIA and Lightcast.
Demand set records in most of 2022
According to Lightcast data, each of the first nine months of 2022 set records for the highest monthly cybersecurity demand since 2012, but cooled in November and December.
However, a key indicator is the ratio of currently employed cybersecurity workers to new openings, which gives an indication of the size of the worker shortfall. The supply-to-demand ratio is currently 68 workers per 100 job openings, edging up from the previous period’s ratio of 65 workers per 100 openings. Based on these numbers, nearly 530,000 more cybersecurity workers are needed in the U.S. in order to close current supply gaps.
Demand for cybersecurity workers rose in both public and private sectors
Between 2021 and 2022, public sector cybersecurity demand grew 25% to 45,708 postings, while private sector demand grew at a rate of 21% to 710,035 job listings. Study data shows an even larger disparity between growth rates when comparing the growth since 2019. In the past three years, private sector cybersecurity demand has grown 36%, while public sector demand grew 58%.
The Washington D.C. metro area alone accounted for 19% (8,686) of all public sector domestic cybersecurity demand in 2022. It’s expected that the D.C. metro area will need 52,634 new cybersecurity workers to close current supply gaps.
Click here for more details on the study.
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