ECSC returns to the black after an increase in cyber security incidents

.The Bradford-based group said this was partly due to an increase in cyber security outbreaks as firms accelerated remote and cloud working during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Ian Mann, chief executive of ECSC, said: "There are two sides to our business. One is experts going out and assessing security and testing it. That is predominantly on clients' sites and that's the bit we saw impacted with Covid.

"We've also got the managed security sites. We've got a security operations centre here in Bradford and one in Brisbane, Australia."

He said managed services recurring revenue are growing at 20 to 30 per cent every year.

"To detect security breaches is technically difficult and the pesky hackers tend to work out of hours," he said.

You see more breaches overnight, at weekends and bank holidays. Most companies just can't get the expertise and get people working 24/7 monitoring systems.

"We do true 24/7 - we have people watching screens on Christmas Day. It's operating the hours that the hackers operate and having the expertise that you get from doing this for 20 years."

Mr Mann said that the increase in cyber security incidents was mainly due to people moving to remote working

"That was quite unfortunate because that's exactly what a lot of companies have had to do in a big rush because of Covid-19," he said

"Now people want flexibility and working from home so there's a lot of rapid change. Generally in cyber security, rapid change is a bad thing.

"The hackers are out there watching and trying to exploit things. We saw a big increase in phishing emails coinciding with Covid so the hackers will exploit any disaster and start sending out fake emails trying to tempt people to click on something."

ECSC's Managed Detection and Response division saw recurring revenue rise 25 per cent to £1.2m in the six months to June 30 and the division's order book rose from £2.7m to £2.9m.

The Assurance division, which covers testing, standards and certification services, saw revenue rise 4 per cent to £1.2m.

The group made an adjusted EBITDA profit of £52,000, up from a £184,000 loss the previous half year.

ECSC won 48 new Assurance clients in the first half of 2020. The group said it has since seen a strong recovery in Assurance revenue, with July trading up 33 per cent on the three previous months. By mid September, Assurance total bookings were up 75 per cent on the first half average.

Mr Mann said the group has exceeded its objective of maintaining a break-even adjusted EBITDA position throughout the Covid-19 crisis.

"We saw an impact in April on projects where we have people working on clients' sites, so testing and reviewing security. We saw a lot of postponements in April," he said.

"Then we saw a slight recovery in May, a better recovery in June and we are now at a level above where we were last year.

"It's been relatively short term. We haven't seen the market being damaged. The need for cyber security is as strong as ever."