Cyber Security Salary Australia 2026 — Seven Roles From Tax Returns, With Take-Home

What cyber security professionals earn: 2023–24 tax returns

In the ATO’s Taxation statistics for 2023–24, 4,070 people gave their occupation as “Cyber security analyst”. Among those who reported wages, the median salary or wage income was $99,733 and the average $108,663. Their average taxable income was $113,408.

The ATO's 2023–24 coding splits cyber security into seven occupations, from analysts to architects. Analysts are the largest group, so the page leads with them; all seven are below.

ATO figures come from 2023–24 individual tax returns: everyone who gave this occupation, including part-time and part-year workers. Salary or wages is the gross wage income people reported (averages and medians count only those who reported some); taxable income adds other income such as interest and business income and subtracts deductions. Neither figure is a full-time rate or a legal minimum.

Median full-time pay

Jobs and Skills Australia puts median full-time earnings for Database and Systems Administrators, and ICT Security Specialists (ANZSCO 2621) at $2,461 a week ($66 an hour), against $1,852 a week for all occupations.

Median weekly pay of full-time, non-managerial adult employees before tax and salary sacrifice, from the ABS Survey of Employee Earnings and Hours (May 2025) as published by Jobs and Skills Australia. It reflects what employers actually pay, including people on enterprise agreements or above-award salaries, so it is a market figure, not a legal minimum.

Cyber Security Professional pay after tax

What each figure on this page leaves after income tax and the Medicare levy, worked out with the same tax engine as the rest of this site. Use the row nearest your own salary to sense-check the net pay on your payslip.

2026–27 resident tax rates with the low income tax offset and the 2% Medicare levy; no HECS-HELP repayment and no Medicare levy surcharge. Superannuation is paid on top by your employer. Your employer withholds tax each pay from the ATO’s withholding schedules, so the tax on a payslip will not match these annual figures to the dollar. For the full breakdown see take-home pay on $110,000 (the nearest step to $108,663), or enter your own salary below.

The table assumes private hospital cover. A single person without it pays the Medicare levy surcharge of 1% to 1.5% once their income for surcharge purposes passes $105,000 (2026–27), which would lower the take-home on the higher rows.

Which award covers cyber security professionals

No award names cyber security roles. Their award coverage, if any, comes through the information technology stream of the Professional Employees Award 2020 [MA000065], which applies only where the employer is principally engaged in the IT, telecommunications services or quality auditing industry (cl 4.1(b)), and only to work needing an ACS-accredited degree or equivalent standing as an ACS Certified Professional (cl 2.3).

A security analyst at a bank, an insurer, a hospital or a government department is outside that stream. Check the award for the employer's industry or your enterprise agreement; if none applies, the National Minimum Wage and the National Employment Standards are the legal floor.

Where the award does apply, a graduate starts at Level 1 pay point 1.1 and an experienced IT employee — 4 years' professional IT experience after the degree — is Level 2. Roles that are wholly or principally managerial are not classified under the award (Schedule A).

Read the Professional Employees Award 2020 [MA000065] on the Fair Work Commission’s site (consolidated to 1 July 2026).

Cyber Security Professional award pay rates 2026–27

These rates apply from the first full pay period starting on or after 1 July 2026. Part-time employees are paid the same hourly rates for the hours they work.

Cyber Security Professional penalty rates and overtime

Percentages of the minimum hourly rate for hours worked at the employer's direction (cl 18.4, Schedule C). There is no Saturday daytime penalty under this award.

Overtime

• Work beyond 38 hours a week, including call-backs and incident work done remotely on a device, is overtime paid at the ordinary minimum hourly rate (cl 18.2(a)).
• The overtime, penalty and record-keeping clauses do not apply once your salary is at least 25% above your level's minimum (cl 18.6): $83,531.25 for a 3-year-degree graduate, $98,545 at Level 2, $107,696.25 at Level 3.

Work out a shift with penalties or overtime using the overtime pay calculator.

Allowances

Checking a cyber security professional payslip

• Night and weekend incident work: below the cl 18.6 salary line, hours worked at your employer's direction before 6 am or after 10 pm Monday to Saturday are paid at 125% — $42.14 an hour for a graduate on the 3-year rate — and Sundays and public holidays at 150%, $50.57 (cl 18.4, Schedule C.1). They must be shown separately from your ordinary pay (Fair Work Ombudsman, pay slips).
• Records: below that line your employer must record hours over 38 a week, before 6 am or after 10 pm, and on Sundays and public holidays (cl 18.5).
• Super and deductions: each payslip must show the super your employer paid, or will pay, for the period and the fund it goes to, and every deduction — salary sacrifice included — with the fund or account it was paid into (Fair Work Ombudsman, pay slips).

For what every line on a payslip should show, see understanding your payslip.

What this page does not show

• Security clearance allowances and public sector cyber security pay scales.
• Contractor day rates: awards and the minimum wage apply to employees, not to independent contractors.
• Recruiter salary surveys: they are not official figures.

Cyber Security Professional pay questions

Pay rates for other jobs