Obtaining Cyber Essentials certification has a whole bundle of benefits, including enhanced security against common cyber threats, increased customer trust, and compliance with industry regulations. It also provides a competitive advantage, potential cost savings from preventing cyber incidents, and peace of mind knowing your systems and data are better protected.

Cyber Essentials is also becoming a regular requirement for both UK Government contracts, and as a pre-requisite for obtaining cyber insurance.

Both are UK government-backed certification schemes aimed at improving cyber security, but there are some crucial difference in the assessments you should be aware of.

Cyber Essentials is certified through a self-assessment where organisations have to describe their technology and procedure, and we the assessor make sure they’re in line with the requirement of the scheme.

Cyber Essentials Plus involves a more rigorous assessment, including an independent external audit and vulnerability tests (we handle those bits) to make sure your technology and proceedures are correctly implemented and effective.

If you’re just starting out, then just going for the basic Cyber Essentials certification is a great place to begin, but if you’re wanting to go the full mile and obtain Cyber Essentials Plus you’ll need to tackle the self-assessment first.

Cyber Essentials is a pre-requisite to taking the Cyber Essentials Plus assessment. You have a 3 month window after you take the self assessment to have passed the CE Plus assessment. This mght sound like a lot of pressure, but you’ll have our team there to support you through the process.