What can organizations do to improve the effectiveness of their security awareness training efforts?

Our lives are increasingly digitalizing with advancements in technology day by day, leading to cyber-attacks and hacking methods being advanced. The organization's operations are highly dependent on technology, communications, customer services, etc. On the other hand, cybercriminals are also becoming more skilled in developing new frauds and methods to hack data. It is crucial to prioritize information and cybersecurity. Security Awareness Training enables users to apprehend an organization's IT policies, practices, and procedures.

Inhaltsverzeichnis Show

What Is Security Awareness?
How Can You Boost Security Awareness Within Your Company?
1. Educate Your Employees About Security Concerns
2. Reward Workers Who Put In Effort To Protect Your Data
3. Utilize The Appropriate Security Tools
4. Boost Your Communication Strategies
5. Perform Regular Cybersecurity Audits

With the increase in cyber-attacks and breaches, organizations need to look at the vulnerabilities in their organizations. It is known that people are at increased risk than software vulnerabilities. Cyber threats are people's problems. Such a robust cyber-security program also involves ensuring that people learn to defend themselves and their organizations against threats., Security awareness training would be an excellent way of training and empowering employees to be secured computer users and at the same time protect the data, networks, and technological resources of the company.

If your organization is interested in setting up a security awareness training program for your employees, you are at the right place. This blog will discuss the best security awareness practices that help the organization stay away from security threats.

What is Security Awareness Training?

The employees of the organization are the weakest link in the security system. They forget things, make mistakes and fall into fraud; This is where security awareness training comes into the picture. Security awareness training involves educating employees about the various risks and threats, and possible vulnerabilities, and how to defend them. Employees must learn the best practices and processes to secure organizations' networks and data from threats.

Security awareness training is important for any organization, especially for an IT-related organization. Employees working on computers, laptops, and other devices are an easy target for attacker’s keen on exploiting a victim's lack of awareness.

A successful security awareness training practice in the organization can encourage employees to participate in security awareness programs and attend security-related events arming them against cybersecurity threats.

6 Best Practices for Security Awareness Training

Involve every level
Security awareness should be mandatory for everyone, from executives to low-level employees. It is especially applicable to senior-level management, as they are high-value targets with access to sensitive information that attackers find valuable. Top-down buy-in and participation are required for the most successful security awareness and training programs. An integrated strategy is the best way to create an organizational security culture in which effective decisions and best practices in cybersecurity become simple objectives for end-users at all levels.
Make Training Ongoing Process
Because training tends to be forgotten over time, a security awareness program should be ongoing. Security awareness makes it possible for employees to understand their role within the organization from information security. It would mean establishing a curriculum that covers the most security threats and maintains the security regularly. Security awareness training should include Social Engineering, spear phishing, phishing, and other cyber-attacks. Organizations can establish training programs when onboarding a new employee. Every day is an excellent time to share mainstream data breach news stories to keep security top of mind and conduct awareness activity that prepares them to defend against threats by themselves. Set up monthly or quarterly security awareness training meetings to teach new policies and strategies to reduce the organization's risk.
Training covers basics
Security awareness training practices should train Employees on fundamental topics like password security, anti-phishing techniques, spear phishing, and social engineering.
Password security: Employees should be explained the importance of password security and trained in creating strong passwords with at least one unique character and avoid writing passwords on post-it notes or sharing with other employees.
Phishing attacks: By security awareness, practices help employees detect harmful emails and report malicious ones; this can reduce phishing attacks. Be cautious of emails from unknown sources. Emails are used in phishing scams to gain access to systems and create disruption. Security practices include topics such as malicious links, attachments. With security awareness, training practices, employees can dramatically improve their understanding of such attacks with consistent training.
Social Engineering: Security awareness practices increase the awareness of risks by everyone in the organization, such as manipulating employees to access others systems or disclosing confidential information to other organizations. Security awareness training can also assist you in identifying and repairing any vulnerabilities in your networks and computer systems. Security awareness practice will then give you and your employees the best chance of avoiding social engineering attacks.
Testing after training
It is essential to have a process to measure the efficiency of training. A quiz is a better way to do this. Quizzes should be imposed to obtain baseline measurements and see what has changed before and after training is implemented. For instance, conducting phishing exercises is one such practice. Employees who fail a phishing test should be given additional, context-sensitive training to address the uncovered deficiencies in the test. After having undergone training, the organizations should regularly monitor whether the employee's response to these drills improves or worse.
Communication
An organization should instil security practices. The senior-level management should communicate on risk and security threats with their employees and guide them in a safer organization. Often, communicate the importance and intent of your awareness program. Employees should understand what's going on, why, and what their role is. Concentrate on content that catches your attention and can influence your personal lives. It takes top priority in cybersecurity and prepares employees better to defend themselves and their firms.
Insert gamification
If your company's culture allows it, experiment with gamification techniques to turn a dull field into a fun challenge. Games will engage focus and have the active participation of employees, and they are an excellent form of encouragement. At least ensure that your cybersecurity goal is achieved with rewards and positive enhancement techniques. Including gamification in the training program will help employees pay attention. True gamification may also be a reward system that positively reinforces learning.

It is obvious now that by security awareness training best practices, employees will be able to protect the organization and look forward to working with other teams to create a safer environment. To make this training success will be vital to understand your organization's unique needs and culture. Making security awareness training an ongoing process in an organization is a must. In addition to this, employees in an organization are not always permanent; a few may leave or join the organization, so security awareness training practices should be a frequent program by which the organization will fall less at risk.

Security Awareness Training is one of the inexpensive means of reducing the risk of incidents and breaches. Aware of EC- Council is a leading name in the industry offers the best Security awareness training Program. We have the most extensive security awareness library, with interactive modules, videos, games which makes the training more fun and exciting. As you know, multiple modals account for different types of learning. They involve employees in successful cybersecurity training to maintain knowledge so that they are better able to respond adequately to potential threats. Aware also offers various templates on phishing to help the employees identify them and report them.

Get your training started here.

References

Check these 5 ways to implement security awareness within your company.

In recent years, the rise of new technologies has given businesses a boost as they aim to remain relevant and competitive in their respective industries. These digital tools have allowed businesses to find different methods to increase their efficiency, productivity, and sales.

However, though there are many benefits to the advancement of technology, it also poses some risks to its users. Specifically, hackers and other unauthorized entities also use technology to their gain, causing damage to systems and networks and stealing personal and business data, digital assets, intellectual property, and other valuable information.

With the increase in cyberattacks in recent years, cybersecurity has also seen enhancements. These days, there are a number of ways you can protect your business from cyber threats, such as through the use of encryption software and constant monitoring of your systems and networks. But at the center of all these security measures is one factor that’s crucial not just for you but for everyone in your company—security awareness.

What Is Security Awareness?

Security awareness is essentially the attitude people have toward the protection of the company’s assets. You must aim to instill this within your employees to ensure that everyone understands the importance of protecting your business. This will help safeguard your business’s assets against theft, destruction, or loss, as it will motivate your employees to do what they can to ensure the security of the company.

How Can You Boost Security Awareness Within Your Company?

Though data security may be a priority for you, that may not necessarily be true for your employees. You could put certain protocols in place, but your staff may not follow it strictly or may brush it off if they see others not taking it seriously. Your security measures are about as effective as the people you trust to uphold them. Therefore, you should aim to boost security awareness within your company.

There are several ways to do this, some of which will be discussed below.

1. Educate Your Employees About Security Concerns

Educating your employees about possible data breaches is an effective way to boost security awareness within your organization. This may involve holding training programs. In these programs, you should ensure that your staff understand the different security risks that may threaten your organization, as well as how those risks could affect them and their workflow. This will prompt them to be more cautious and to better manage and secure sensitive business data.

To help you structure your program better, you could consult with a cyber security risk assessment provider like Techumen or other reliable security firms. This will give you a more concrete idea of what risks pose the biggest threat to your company, and it also allows you to see what areas of your security system you need to strengthen.

2. Reward Workers Who Put In Effort To Protect Your Data

Another effective strategy to promote security awareness within your organization is to recognize and reward employees who work to protect your company’s data. Appreciating your employees allows them to feel valued. For that reason, they can go the extra mile to ensure your business data is protected.

In addition, rewarding your workers helps boost their collaborative efforts to instill security awareness within the organization. They can do more research and educate one another about the best measures to take to protect the company’s data.

3. Utilize The Appropriate Security Tools

Once you’ve trained your workers on possible security risks within your organization, you will need to have the right security tools. Your staff can only do so much to protect your business data if your cybersecurity system and tools are faulty.

It would be a good idea to research the best security tools in the market. If that seems overwhelming, given all the options available to you today, you can work with managed service providers who specialize in cybersecurity. With their expertise, they can recommend the best security tools that suit your business needs, and they could even handle the installation and implementation.

4. Boost Your Communication Strategies

Communication can play a significant role in creating security awareness within your business enterprise. By boosting your communication strategies, you ensure that the top management can easily and promptly pass information about data security on to the junior staff. This is especially important for major updates or warnings on possible scams going around.

Your communication strategies could involve the use of internal memos, emails, and other communications tools. In addition, you could create a social media account for your business, where you could update your staff and give occasional reminders about data security awareness and protection.

5. Perform Regular Cybersecurity Audits

Conducting regular security audits is another effective way to boost security awareness. This would involve examining your business’s systems and networks for vulnerabilities. You could choose to make this a monthly or quarterly thing, so long as you ensure that your employees are aware of when it happens. If they see how serious and thorough you are with the business’s security, they may also feel obliged to take it seriously.

Takeaway

Security awareness is crucial in the protection of your company’s assets. Though you may have the best cybersecurity measures in place, that doesn’t account for incidents that could occur due to human error. Your employees are an important aspect of data security, and they can help strengthen the security protocols already in place. With the tips above, you can implement security awareness within your company and thus provide further protection for your business data.