In the security arms race, the numbers are against the defenders.

That’s not to say that there are more hackers in the world than security professionals and practitioners. In the grand scheme of things, security people will always outnumber those meaning to do harm or steal data. Rather, it boils down to simple math: Security practitioners must defend all their data and infrastructure all the time without fail. Hackers need only penetrate a defense once to succeed.

Security spending continues to increase at an annual rate of 8% to 10%, as organizations of every size–from small businesses to multinational enterprises– adopt and deploy new technologies to counter the persistently expanding threats to their data and operations. Unfortunately, there simply aren’t enough people to run all that technology. According to Cybersecurity Ventures, 3.5 million security jobs will go unfilled by 2021.

How does a business close the jobs and skills gap amid a severe talent drought?

Services.

Managed security services are a means of scaling limited talent and resources across multiple businesses. MSSPs–managed services providers with security offerings–can provide expertise and technology to customers that can’t afford to acquire the products and people on their own.

For too long, service providers positioned security services as a delivery solution, and that value proposition isn’t invalid. It’s true that MSSPs are adept at giving customers access to technologies that they can’t ordinarily afford on their own. Security services often comprise stacks of complementary technologies that work in concert to detect and evaluate security threats and take remedial actions. In many cases, MSSPs are more adept than end users at security vigilance because they support multiple accounts and locations, and therefore have greater visibility across the threat landscape. They can see more than any individual company can.

But MSSPs offer value beyond just visibility. Managed services are about scale, a one-to-many service and support proposition. MSSPs can provide security analysts, firewall administrators, incident-response specialists and other specialized security experts at a fraction of the cost and with, in many cases, greater efficacy.

Moreover, an MSSP’s value proposition isn’t just the ability to perform certain functions that would ordinarily go to an in-house staffer; it can also help businesses stay up-to-date. When businesses hire security pros, they must also invest in training and education to keep them up-to-speed on the latest technologies, threats and protection strategies. MSSPs do that as a standard operating procedure. They must continuously add value to their service offerings, and a large part of that is staff training.

Whether you’re a solution provider thinking about services, a managed services provider thinking about security or an established MSSP, you should consider scalability as a value proposition for customers. You should explain to them that your security services are about more than just outsourcing, stopgaps, and augmentation. Instead, you should show your customers that your security services give them access to the human talent they can’t easily get on their own.

Ultimately, managed security services allow defenders to counteract being outnumbered in the security arms race. Email [email protected] to learn more.

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