In-House SOC vs MSSP
In-house SOC or MSSP — it’s a real decision that turns on cost, coverage, talent availability, and risk tolerance. This guide gives leaders a structured way to make it.
- The cost comparison most spreadsheets miss
- Coverage — what 24/7 actually requires
- Talent acquisition and retention realities
- Hybrid models and when they work
- Decision framework for security leaders
The honest comparison.
A fully-staffed internal SOC providing 24/7 coverage requires somewhere between 8-12 FTEs at the floor — senior analyst, mid-tier analyst, and Level 1 staff across three shifts plus weekends. Add tooling licenses, training, the recruiting cost to fill the inevitable gaps as people leave, and the management overhead. That number is rarely less than $2M-$3M annually, and frequently more.
A managed SOC service with equivalent capability typically runs a fraction of that. Not because the people are cheaper, but because the economics work in a model where the same senior analyst tenure is shared across many customers.
What 24/7 really means.
24/7/365 coverage is harder than it sounds. Holidays. Sick days. Vacation. The natural reality that one analyst on a quiet Sunday at 3am cannot effectively handle a multi-vector incident alone. Internal SOCs that claim 24/7 coverage typically have realistic coverage only during business hours, with on-call rotations for after-hours that introduce response delay.
You keep what you should. You outsource what you should.
The right answer for most organizations isn’t pure in-house or pure outsourced. It’s hybrid. The internal team owns strategy, vendor selection, risk acceptance, and the business-context decisions that an outside team can’t make well. The managed provider owns the operational layer — monitoring, detection, investigation, response — where coverage and depth matter most.
Designed as a hybrid by default.
Digital Hands’ model is co-managed by default. You keep administrative access, decision authority, and the strategic layer. We bring the 24/7 operational capability. MDR for detection and response. Security Program Advisory for the strategic engagement.