The information security market will hit US$170 billion (£120 billion, AU$227 billion) by 2020, a growth projection of some US$100 billion (£70 billion, A$134 billion) from current figures according to analyst firms.

India-based firm MarketsandMarkets says the 2020 total includes security technologies like data leak prevention, denial of service attack mitigation, and compliance, along with security services.

Gartner offers similar figures. In its latest November figures provided to Vulture South security spend pegged at US$75 billion (£68 billion, A$100 billion) are reckoned be worth US$91 billion (£83 billion, A$122 billion) by year's end,.

The firm says the security industry will be worth some US$116 billion (£106 billion, A$155 billion) by 2019 with security services including consulting, hardware support, and outsourcing adding a further US$73 billion (£66 billion, A$98 billion) by 2019.

"MarketsandMarkets expects the global cyber security market to grow from US$106.32 billion in 2015 to US$170.21 billion by 2020, at a compound annual growth rate of 9.8 percent," MarketsandMarkets says.

"In the current scenario, North America is expected to be the largest market on the basis of spending and adoption of cyber security solutions and services [and will] retain its position as the highest revenue generator for the cyber security market during the entire forecast period, while significant revenue growth is expected from Latin America and Asia-Pacific regions.

"Among the services, managed security service is rapidly gaining traction by covering 40 percent of the security market in 2015."

The firm lists large security industry players as IBM, Intel, Booz Allen Hamilton, and CSC among others. ®