Cliffside Cybersecurity launches Security Architecture as a Service (SecArch-a-a-S) in Australia
Announcement posted by Cliffside Cybersecurity 08 Apr 2026
SYDNEY, 8 April 2026 — Cliffside Cybersecurity has launched SecArch-as-a-Service: fractional security architecture for Australian organisations that need senior architectural oversight without a permanent hire.
The service addresses a problem most organisations only recognise after the damage is done. Material security gaps are rarely discovered at the end of delivery. They are introduced much earlier, when systems and controls are designed without qualified architectural scrutiny.
"When you build a house, the tradies do not start work until the design has been vetted by an architect, and delivery is not accepted until that architect has reviewed the result," said Adri Leite, Founder and CEO of Cliffside Cybersecurity. "Your technology environment should be no different. If you are making material decisions about cloud, identity, network design or resilience without proper architectural oversight, you are building risk into the business from day one."
The offering is delivered through three models: point-in-time architecture reviews for organisations that need a structured assessment of their current posture; project augmentation, where a senior security architect is embedded into a major transformation or delivery programme; and SecArch-as-a-Service, an ongoing fractional arrangement for organisations that need continuous access to architecture expertise.
Under the SecArch-as-a-Service model, clients get a dedicated Cliffside security architect on a defined days-per-month, project-duration or on-demand basis. That architect supports design reviews, architecture decisions, control design, technical assurance and ongoing advisory across the wider programme. The aim is straightforward: experienced architecture discipline inside the organisation without the cost, recruitment delay and overhead of a permanent hire.
Cliffside has already onboarded clients in the banking and energy sectors.
According to Leite, the demand reflects a broader shift in how organisations are thinking about cyber risk. Boards and executive teams are under growing pressure to demonstrate not just that controls exist, but that their environments are designed to limit blast radius, support recovery and stand up to regulatory and operational scrutiny.
Cliffside's position is that cyber resilience is not a product category or a tooling exercise. It is a structural property of how systems are designed, segmented and governed. Organisations that recover well from serious incidents tend to have one thing in common: their architecture was built with failure in mind.
"Too many organisations are spending heavily on security tooling while leaving the underlying architecture underdesigned, undocumented or unmanaged," said Leite. "That creates a false sense of confidence. Tools matter, but they do not compensate for poor design. SecArch-as-a-Service gives organisations access to senior architecture expertise when real decisions are being made, not after the fact."
The capability covers network, identity, cloud (Azure, AWS and Microsoft 365), endpoint and detection architecture, zero trust readiness, and control gap analysis. The approach is tied to business risk, implementation reality and the operating context of each client, not generic checklists or vendor-driven recommendations.
Outputs vary based on the maturity of each organisation but typically include enterprise reference architectures, reusable design patterns, security guardrails, risk-ranked findings and a plain-language summary for leadership. Every deliverable is designed to be readily consumable, reusable across teams and auditors, and treated as a living document rather than a point-in-time report that sits in a drawer.
About Cliffside Cybersecurity
Cliffside Cybersecurity is an Australian cybersecurity advisory firm established in 2014, built on a simple principle: assess first, recommend honestly, even when it costs us the engagement. ISO 27001 certified, with OSCP and CISSP-credentialed practitioners, Cliffside works with organisations across strategy, architecture, compliance, cloud security and managed cybersecurity services including SOC, security awareness and third-party risk management.
Media contact:
Adri Leite - CEO