Virtual CISO Services for Accounting Firms
What is a Virtual CISO?
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A Virtual Chief Information Security Officer (vCISO) delivers the strategic leadership of a full-time CISO but on a flexible, subscription basis. Instead of recruiting a six-figure executive, you reserve a capped block of expert hours each month—handled by a seasoned security leader who already speaks the language of auditors and regulators
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For CPA and Legal firms, that means:
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Regulatory alignment with the FTC Safeguards Rule, SOC 2, and state privacy statutes, without hiring an internal compliance department.
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Client and partner confidence reinforced by clear, board-ready cyber-risk metrics.
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Predictable cost control plus the option to scale up during audit season or M&A due-diligence crunches.​
What is the Role of the Virtual CISO?
A virtual Chief Information Security Officer (vCISO) is an on-demand executive who provides C-suite-level security leadership without the expense of a full-time hire, delivering a tailored roadmap that aligns cyber controls, budgets, and risk appetite with business objectives.
Acting as strategist, risk translator, and program driver, the vCISO identifies and prioritizes threats, maps controls to regulations such as GLBA, IRS 4557, and ABA Model Rules, oversees day-to-day security operations and incident-response readiness, vets vendors, and converts technical data into board-friendly metrics. Engagements are structured around brief steering calls and deep-dive work cycles, with most tasks handled quietly in the background to minimize disruption during busy seasons.
The result is executive-grade oversight, audit-ready documentation, and rapid breach coordination delivered flexibly and cost-effectively, which is ideal for firms that handle sensitive data but don’t need a full-time CISO.​​
How Much Does a CISO Cost?
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A full-time Chief Information Security Officer typically commands a six-figure salary plus benefits and equity: mid-market averages run about $181,000 per year, while larger-enterprise packages frequently land in the $346k – $429k range before bonuses. Once you add 20-30 % for payroll taxes, health insurance, and long-term incentives, the total cost of keeping a permanent CISO on staff can easily exceed $225k for smaller firms and push past $500k at the upper end.
By contrast, virtual-CISO services are priced more like outside counsel: hourly engagements average $200 – $300, retainers generally fall between $1.6 k and $20 k per month (most small firms settle in the $2 k – $4.5 k band), and one-off projects cluster around $8 k – $10 k. Even at the high-touch end of that spectrum, a year of vCISO coverage usually costs 40-80 % less than hiring a full-time CISO, while still giving you executive-level oversight scaled to your actual risk and seasonal workload.
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You can compare the cost of a full time CISO to our vCISO packages below.
When Does it Make Sense to Hire a vCISO?​
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Hiring a vCISO makes the most sense when your firm’s data sensitivity and regulatory exposure have outgrown the “IT-handles-security” model, yet the budget, headcount, or workload still don’t justify a full-time C-suite hire. Typical inflection points include: you’re handling financial, legal, or health data that triggers frameworks like GLBA, IRS Pub. 4557, or ABA Model Rules; clients, insurers, or auditors are asking for proof of executive-level security oversight; growth, M&A, or new service lines are expanding your attack surface faster than you can staff; seasonal busy periods leave no margin for large-scale security projects; or your internal IT/MSP team excels tactically but needs a strategist to translate risk into board-level priorities. In these situations, a vCISO provides on-demand leadership, compliance expertise, and incident-response command, delivering exactly the hours you need at a fraction of the cost of a permanent CISO while keeping the firm focused on billable work.