A Security Operations Centre (SOC) is a 24/7 team of analysts that monitors your environment for threats, investigates alerts, and responds to incidents. Precursor Security's UK-based CREST-accredited SOC provides continuous threat detection, human-reviewed alerting, and managed incident response for organisations across the UK.
Your network doesn't stop being
attacked at 5 PM.
We don't stop watching.
Precursor Security operates a CREST-accredited outsourced security operations centre from a physical facility in Newcastle. UK-based analysts monitor your environment 24 hours a day, every day of the year. When a critical alert fires, a human analyst begins triage immediately, not a ticket queue or an automated email. Fully managed SOC from as low as £900/month.
SOC as a Service: Human analysts watching your environment 24/7.
Most IT teams are not security teams. When an alert fires at 11 PM on a Friday, the person on call is fielding password resets, not triaging ransomware precursors. Our analysts work in shifts from a physical facility in Newcastle. The screens are always watched by someone whose only job is threat detection.
Book a Scoping CallWhat Our Managed
SOC Covers.
Six integrated capabilities, delivered by CREST-accredited analysts from our physical UK facility. Every alert is triaged by a human. Every finding is validated before escalation.
SIEM & Log Correlation
We ingest logs from everywhere: Microsoft 365, firewalls, workstations, and cloud platforms. Our cloud-native SIEM correlates events across your entire digital estate, while EdgeProtect continuously monitors your external attack surface for exposed services and compromised credentials.
Managed EDR
We deploy and manage Endpoint Detection & Response agents (Microsoft Defender, SentinelOne, CrowdStrike) to stop ransomware at the process level. Every endpoint alert is triaged by a human analyst, not an automated playbook.
Threat Hunting
We leverage our Offensive Security roots (CREST) to hunt for enablers of compromise that automated tools miss: dormant lateral movement paths, misconfigured Conditional Access policies, and overprivileged service accounts waiting to be exploited.
Immediate Critical Triage
When a critical alert fires, the on-shift analyst begins triage immediately, ahead of all lower-priority work. All confirmed threats are escalated to your designated contacts via your preferred communication method. This is not a ticket queue or an automated email.
EdgeProtect ASM
Continuous monitoring of your external attack surface: exposed services, vulnerable software versions, subdomain takeover risks, and compromised credentials on dark web markets. Findings feed directly into SOC detection rules for closed-loop protection.
Compliance Reporting
Monthly service review calls, audit-ready event logs with 12-month retention, and documented SLA performance. Satisfies ISO 27001 A.12.4, NIS2 continuous monitoring, and DORA operational resilience requirements.
SOC Investment Profile
Building an in-house SOC is hugely expensive. Outsourcing delivers equivalent or superior capability at a fraction of the cost.
In-House SOC Cost/Year
3 analysts in salary alone, before SIEM licensing, tooling, threat intel, training, and management overhead.
UK Human Analyst Coverage
Every critical alert is investigated by a UK-based analyst. Phone notification for all confirmed threats.
Compliance Frameworks
Evidence generated automatically for ISO 27001, NIS2, DORA, GDPR, Cyber Essentials, and PCI DSS.
Controls
The Precursor Advantage.
A physical UK facility with dedicated analysts, combined with offensive security integration that strengthens your defences every day.
See the SOC.
Visit our analyst floor in Newcastle. See the screens, meet the team, and watch a live threat hunt in progress. We run tours for procurement teams, CISOs, and board members. No sales pitch. Just evidence.
Book a SOC TourThe Closed-Loop Advantage.
Our penetration testers use live SOC threat intelligence to test your defences against active attack patterns. This continuous loop between offensive and defensive operations means your security posture strengthens every single day.
We work with your existing stack.
No rip-and-replace. We integrate with your current SIEM, EDR, and cloud platforms from day one.
Microsoft Sentinel
Microsoft Defender
CrowdStrike Falcon
SentinelOne
Elastic Security
Azure / Entra ID
AWS CloudTrail
Cloudflare
Managed SOC Pricing
We publish our pricing structure because scope ambiguity is a form of commercial dishonesty. Every tier shows exactly what is included. If your situation does not fit neatly, a scoping call takes 30 minutes and results in a fixed quote.
Fully Managed SOC
Turnkey OperationsWe handle everything. 24/7 monitoring, detection, and response across endpoints, cloud, and network. Your virtual security team protecting you around the clock.
Hybrid Cloud SOC
Targeted CoverageTargeted monitoring for specific assets (AWS/Azure environment, OT/IoT networks) or specific compliance requirements such as PCI-DSS or NIS2.
Onboarding Workflow
Most organisations are fully operational within 2-3 weeks. Four stages from scoping call to 24/7 monitoring.
Scoping & Contract
30-minute scoping call to assess your log sources, user count, and existing tooling. Fixed monthly price confirmed before work begins.
Connector Deployment
Lightweight agents and API integrations deployed to your Microsoft 365, Azure, firewall, and EDR platform. Typically 3-5 business days.
Baseline & Tuning
Behavioural profiling of your environment and detection rule tuning to eliminate false positives before 24/7 monitoring begins.
24/7 Monitoring Live
Full 24/7/365 monitoring active. Monthly service review calls, quarterly threat reviews, and continuous detection engineering.
What You Get
Every managed SOC engagement includes the following, regardless of tier.
All service tiers include our proprietary Threat Intelligence Feed, Rapid Incident Response SLA, and CREST-accredited analyst oversight.
Strengthen Defences.
Test What You Protect.
Your SOC detects threats. Our penetration testers validate whether those defences hold. We feed pentest findings directly back into SOC detection rules, building custom alerts for your specific attack surface. This is the closed-loop advantage.
Explore Penetration TestingPenetration Testing
Validate your SOC detections with manual exploitation by CREST-certified testers.
Red Team Operations
Full-scope adversarial simulation to test your SOC team under realistic attack conditions.
EdgeProtect ASM
Continuous external attack surface monitoring, included with every SOC tier.
Configuration Reviews
Harden the infrastructure your SOC monitors with expert configuration assessment.
Full Services Catalogue
Comprehensive penetration testing services tailored to your environment.
Internal Testing
Post-perimeter assessments targeting Active Directory, lateral movement, privilege escalation, and segmentation validation from inside your network.
Talk to a SOC Analyst, Not a Sales Team.
Most organisations who complete a scoping call receive a formal proposal within 48 hours. The call takes 30 minutes. You will speak with a SOC analyst who understands your environment, not a salesperson reading from a script.
Managed SOC: Common Questions
Pricing, onboarding, coverage, and compliance.
Managed SOC services start from as low as £900 per month, scaling to £12,000+ depending on organisation size, log volume, and service tier. Entry-level managed SOC for small organisations (50-100 users, basic log sources) starts from £900/month including 24/7 monitoring and incident alerting. Standard managed SOC for mid-sized organisations (100-500 users, EDR + cloud logs) typically costs £4,000-£7,000/month with threat hunting and dedicated analyst support. Enterprise SOC for large organisations (500+ users, complex multi-cloud environments) ranges £8,000-£12,000+/month with dedicated analyst teams. We provide fixed monthly pricing after a free scoping call.
MDR (Managed Detection and Response) is endpoint and cloud workload-focused: it deploys an agent on your devices and responds to endpoint-level threats. A Managed SOC has broader scope: it ingests network logs, identity events, cloud access logs, application logs, and firewall data alongside endpoint telemetry, correlating signals across your entire digital estate. In practice, the categories overlap significantly. The key differences are: (1) Coverage scope: SOC is broader; MDR is deeper on endpoints; (2) Human involvement: good SOC services include human threat hunters; many MDR offerings are heavily automated; (3) Compliance output: SOC services typically produce the audit-trail evidence that frameworks like ISO 27001 and NIS2 require. Our Managed SOC includes managed EDR alongside SIEM monitoring, meaning it covers both categories.
Even a small in-house SOC team of three analysts costs upwards of £210,000 per year in salaries alone, before SIEM licensing, tooling, threat intelligence subscriptions, training, and management overhead. A full 24/7 capability requires additional headcount to maintain continuous coverage, pushing total costs significantly higher. Outsourced SOC services start from £900/month and include the platform, tooling, analyst team, and management. Most organisations also find that an outsourced SOC is operational within 2-3 weeks, versus 6-12 months to build an internal capability.
Most organisations are fully operational within 2-3 weeks. The process has four stages: (1) Scoping call and contract signature (Day 1-3); (2) Log connector deployment to your environment (Days 3-7, typically involving installing a lightweight agent or configuring API integrations with Microsoft 365, Azure, your firewall, and EDR platform); (3) Log ingestion begins and baseline behaviour profiling starts (Days 7-14); (4) Detection rules tuned to your environment and full 24/7 monitoring begins (Days 14-21). Organisations with complex multi-cloud environments or large numbers of data sources may require 4-6 weeks for full coverage.
Internal IT teams and managed SOC services serve fundamentally different purposes: (1) IT staff focus on system availability and user support. They are not trained to detect sophisticated threats like credential abuse, lateral movement, or fileless malware; (2) 24/7/365 coverage requires a minimum of five security analysts at £40,000-£70,000 each plus management overhead, far exceeding managed SOC costs; (3) Security monitoring requires specialist SIEM/EDR skills, threat intelligence, and detection engineering that IT generalists do not possess; (4) Alert fatigue is real. Internal teams processing 500+ daily alerts quickly become desensitised, while SOC analysts have refined playbooks; (5) Cyber insurance increasingly requires 24/7 monitoring by qualified security professionals. Most organisations use internal IT for system administration while outsourcing threat detection to a specialist SOC provider.
Yes. Our Security Operations Centre is staffed 24/7/365 from our physical UK facility in Newcastle. We monitor your environment around the clock, including weekends and public holidays. Every analyst is UK-based. We do not use follow-the-sun offshore models.
We specialise in Microsoft Sentinel and Elastic. We can also ingest logs from any source using our custom collectors. For organisations without an existing SIEM, we can deploy and manage the platform as part of the service.
When a critical alert fires, the on-shift analyst drops all lower-priority work and begins immediate investigation. All confirmed threats are escalated to your designated contacts via your preferred communication method, with a phone call for high-severity incidents.
Yes. Precursor Security operates a physical UK-based Security Operations Centre in Newcastle. We do not use a follow-the-sun model with offshore analysts. All data remains within UK data residency requirements, and every analyst is UK-based, DBS-checked, and CREST-certified.