Onecom, the UK's leading independent business communications technology partner, has reported a rise of almost 1,000% in demand for its AI-accelerated penetration testing platform PenX as businesses seek affordable ways to protect against rising levels of cyber-attacks.
The growth, recorded over six months from April this year, reflects increasing demand from businesses for affordable testing to identify security vulnerabilities, and a shift away from traditional annual or periodic penetration tests towards continuous protection.
It comes as the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) warns that the UK faces a real prospect of an unprecedented rise in cyber incidents in the coming months, partly driven by AI being used to identify and exploit vulnerabilities on a scale never seen before.
Aaron Brown, CEO of Onecom Technology Group, said: “Attackers don’t wait for your annual test, and businesses are realising they cannot either. As attacks by malicious actors increase, penetration testing is a vital weapon in the fight against cyber-crime, but it has traditionally been out of reach for many businesses because of the cost and time involved.
“PenX changes that through comprehensive AI-accelerated testing and reporting, validated by human experts. It provides reassurance at a scale previously available only to the largest companies. Our growth in just six months demonstrates demand for a faster, more affordable way to identify security weaknesses before attackers do.”
Traditional penetration testing typically requires around 21 days of specialist manpower and costs between £10,000 and £25,000 per test, depending on the size of the organisation.
By contrast, the AI technology developed in-house by the PenX team can carry out the equivalent of a full penetration test across an organisation's web addresses and APIs in less than a day. The service is available for a monthly fee, typically around £200 for a mid-sized business.
PenX enables more frequent, ongoing testing, helping businesses maintain visibility of their security vulnerabilities. It can also scale according to the size of each organisation, testing anything from a single domain to thousands in one cycle.
The system produces a comprehensive, audit-grade report within 24 hours, which is then validated by human experts. Reports include board-level executive summaries, evidence of each identified issue and step-by-step remediation guidance, helping businesses prepare for SOC 2 and ISO 27001 audits.
Businesses can claim a free health check and find out more at https://www.onecom.co.uk/penx