The private security sector in South Africa has become one of the country's largest employers. Annually, businesses and households spend almost 87 billion rand on security services, video surveillance, armed response, and investigations, providing employment for about 383,000 people.
According to the latest industrial services report from Statistics South Africa, the investigation and security industry employed 382,670 people in 2024, making it the largest employer in the business services sector. This industry accounted for 18.9% of sector employment and showed a growth of 23% compared to 311,100 employees in 2020, which is the most significant increase among all surveyed industries.
Private security companies conduct patrols in residential areas, shopping centers, office parks, schools, hospitals, mines, and factories. Other companies provide armed response, electronic surveillance, cash transportation, and specialized investigation services.
The main consumers of these services are businesses, which spent 66.3 billion rand on investigation and security services in 2024. Households contributed 11.6 billion rand, while government institutions and public bodies spent just over 7 billion rand.
Security and guard services generate the highest revenue, bringing in 34.8 billion rand, accounting for 43% of the total security revenue. Monitoring and surveillance services also made a significant contribution (17.9 billion rand), as did armed response and mobile patrolling (14.3 billion rand), cash transport operations (14.4 billion rand), and access control services (7.6 billion rand).
Despite some crime categories improving—for example, apartment burglaries in residences decreased by 8.7% year-on-year, and robberies in dwellings decreased by 18.3%—the demand for private security remains high. A Governance, Public Safety and Justice Survey by Statistics South Africa showed that home invasion remains the most common crime in households, and many crimes are never reported to the police, which distorts official statistics.
The industry's revenue grew to nearly 87 billion rand in 2024, which is 29% higher than the 67.6 billion rand recorded in 2020.
Although the industry is the largest employer in the business services sector, it contributes only 4.7% of the total business services revenue, while its share of employment is 18.9%. This highlights the labor-intensive nature of private security. The average annual salary in the industry was 110,834 rand in 2024, less than half of the sector average of 241,722 rand.
Most workers are full-time employees (379,483 out of 382,670), with the vast majority being male (287,357 versus 95,313 women). Large companies employ 178,378 people, but small, medium, and micro-enterprises provide over 204,000 jobs.
Financial institutions in South Africa are forced to cope with an increasingly hostile cybersecurity landscape and must take urgent measures to protect their operations before new regulations come into effect.
As South African financial institutions prepare to implement the Conduct of Financial Institutions Bill (COFI Bill), concerns arise regarding their readiness not only to meet compliance requirements but also to counter the constantly evolving spectrum of cyber threats. This upcoming bill, awaiting Parliament's approval, aims to improve operational protocols in the sector, yet the pace of cyber threat development significantly outstrips the speed of legislative progress.
The Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA) has strongly urged institutions to prepare well in advance for this major transformation, anticipating a transition period of about three years after the law is enacted.
Cybersecurity is under intense scrutiny, especially given a report from the South African Banking Risk Information Centre, which recorded an alarming 86% year-on-year increase in digital fraud within the banking sector. This led to nearly 100,000 incidents, with losses reaching a substantial amount of 1.888 billion rand. The emergence of AI-based attack tools allows vulnerabilities to be exploited at unprecedented speeds.
Rynier Schuman, a cybersecurity architect at Palo Alto Networks, emphasizes that threats remain pressing and acute, even as the regulatory framework is being finalized. He asserts that 'trust is the foundation of every financial institution' and notes that the information needed by criminals is often already publicly available, making it critical for institutions to recognize how convincingly attackers can impersonate legitimate clients.
Schuman lists five critical issues currently facing the financial sector:
Schuman warns that 'resilience cannot be tied to a single regulatory date.' He adds that institutions viewing readiness for COFI merely as a legal exercise may inadvertently overlook broader obligations related to technology and operations.
As the cyber threat environment continues to change rapidly, institutions must act decisively, integrating robust cybersecurity practices into their operational culture instead of passively waiting for legislative changes. Schuman concludes that institutions best prepared for the future will view compliance as a foundation for building dynamic and forward-looking security strategies.
The South African construction industry has undergone significant changes due to criminal activity, prolonged power outages, and weak economic growth. These factors have led to the decline of some of the country's largest contractors while simultaneously creating opportunities for smaller firms, which now play a much more substantial role in the sector.
According to Statistics South Africa, the industry has faced numerous difficulties over many years, including low economic growth rates, insufficient investment, power supply issues (load shedding), labor shortages, the Covid-19 pandemic, and criminal activity.
One manifestation of this criminal activity has been the emergence of so-called 'construction mafia' groups. The law firm Cliffe Dekker Hofmeyr reported that these organized groups are increasingly targeting construction projects using methods of blackmail, intimidation, and site intrusion. This results in project delays, increased costs, and undermined investor confidence.
The difficult business conditions coincided with the bankruptcy or restructuring of some of South Africa's largest construction companies, such as Group Five and Basil Read, as well as major reorganizations at Murray & Roberts, fundamentally altering the structure of the entire industry.
This decline was exacerbated by a scandal involving collusion. In 2009, the Competition Commission began investigating alleged anti-competitive practices among construction companies involved in building stadiums for the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Allegations included bid rigging, price fixing, and artificial profit inflation across at least six stadiums.
Companies involved in the settlement process included Murray & Roberts, Aveng, WBHO, Group Five, and Stefanutti Stocks. In June 2013, the Competition Tribunal reached a settlement with 15 builders, imposing fines exceeding 1.5 billion rand. Furthermore, the University of Cape Town noted that the City of Cape Town filed civil lawsuits amounting to 428 million rand against companies that colluded on the Greenpoint stadium tender. The University indicated that the stadium's initial budget was 2.9 billion rand, but the final cost reached 4.5 billion rand.
The contribution of construction to South Africa's gross domestic product peaked at 4.2% in 2008, after which it began a steady decline to 2.3% by 2025. In real terms, the industry volume decreased from 156 billion rand in 2016 to 99.1 billion rand last year, according to Stats SA.
The latest Stats SA report on the construction industry for 2024 shows that small and micro-enterprises accounted for 32.2% of total construction revenue in 2024, up from 25% a decade ago. Their contribution to employment has also significantly increased: in 2024, small and micro-enterprises provided 55.3% of all construction jobs, compared to 40.6% in 2014. Only micro-enterprises were responsible for 44.8% of sector employment.
The statistical agency notes that the overall employment level in the construction industry has fluctuated over many years but does not show a clear long-term trend, and large enterprises are becoming less significant in the construction sector.
Parallel to this, the dominance of the industry's largest companies has gradually weakened. In 2014, the top 100 construction firms generated 40% of the industry's total revenue. By 2024, this share had dropped to 26.7%, indicating a less concentrated industry structure with income distributed among a larger number of enterprises.
Nevertheless, large companies remain important players, accounting for 43% of the industry's revenue in 2024, although they occupy only 21.4% of the jobs. Small, medium, and micro-enterprises employ the remaining 78.6% of the workforce in the industry. Gauteng remains the center of construction in South Africa, providing 35.3% of service revenue, 32.8% of wages, and 26.2% of employment. However, Gauteng's share of industry activity has declined since 2020, while the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal have expanded their presence.
Signs of recovery are being observed, although the sector still lags significantly behind previous peak figures. In 2024, employment increased by 12.5% to 539,056 people compared to the 2020 baseline, but remained below the 592,125 recorded in 2017. Building construction showed the largest increase in jobs, adding 22,947 jobs between 2020 and 2024. Average annual wages and salaries also rose from 150,541 to 171,316 rand during this period.
According to Stats SA, the results indicate that over the last decade, the industry has become less concentrated, with small firms playing an increasingly important role in generating revenue and creating jobs.
