Staff time, log processing, and legacy issues can turn free, open-source or low-cost SIEMs into one of your organisation's most expensive investments. You're not alone if you're baulking at the idea of paying upwards of tens of thousands of pounds for a new or renewed SIEM licence. Many security decision-makers feel the same way. One survey showed that almost half (40%) of existing SIEM users feel like they are overpaying for their SIEM.

As we've covered before, SIEMs are an expensive tool. The average enterprise-level SIEM deployment costs over £15 million a year, and operating a small, 100 to 1000-seat SIEM will still run up bills of over £10k monthly. SIEMs create spiralling costs that eat security budgets. Without a skilled team operating them, they can also make organisations less secure despite receiving more information about their digital estates. But where do these SIEM costs come from?

Are most network detection and response tools missing something? We think so. Network detection and response (NDR) is an incredible technology. With it, you can analyse network packets for malicious behaviour, spot insider threats, and even find connected devices you don’t own. However, if you want to implement NDR in your environment, you typically need to install proprietary hardware or run your NDR on a dedicated server.

What tools does the average security operations centre (SOC) use in 2024? What gets in the way when they deploy a new tool? And how stressed are security pros really? These were just some of the questions we wanted to find out the answer to when we partnered with OnePoll at the end of 2023/the start of 2024. Together, we surveyed 250 British and Irish Heads of IT at companies with 500+ employees. Here’s what they said.