Cybersecurity training focuses increasing employee knowledge and awareness on the potential cyber risks, vulnerabilities and the most common threats that can negatively impact on their business.
Defining Cybersecurity Training
Cybersecurity training is used to equip employees with the practical knowledge and understanding of the digital landscape. Identifying the various security threats that could occur when working with different types of technology (e.g. computers, laptops, mobiles, tablets, printers etc.), networks and cloud services.
Employees are at the forefront of any business and are simultaneously one of the biggest targets and threats to a company’s cybersecurity. There are numerous different cyber threats that can impact on a company ranging from technological failure and human error to cybercrimes. Increases in remote working has also brought new and increased risks to businesses, as employers have less control over the security systems surrounding an employees workstation when it is out with an office setting.
Thus, it is important that employees are appropriately trained in formal procedures such as identifying and reporting issues, the correct handling of sensitive data and protecting business assets from unauthorised access to mitigate the possibility of a security breach.
Cybersecurity training must be regularly reviewed and updated and the cyber threat landscape is constantly evolving. Various different training methods should be implemented within a business to ensure that employees have the most comprehensive understanding of both common and uncommon cyber threats.
Types of Cybersecurity Training:
Cybersecurity Awareness Training
One of the most basic forms of cyber training focuses on increasing employee awareness of the different cyber threats out there. It is normally integrated into other training courses that must be completed during the onboarding process for new employees and revied yearly for permanent employees.
Common cybercrimes covered in awareness training are social engineering, phishing and online risks to data. Therefore some of the main topics that will appear are email security; internet security; information sharing procedures; verification processes; security policies. This training helps enforce an employee’s understanding of their responsibility and legal obligation surrounding the protection of company and client data. It is important to make employees aware of the procedures surrounding identifying a potential threat and who to report this to within the business.
Phishing Simulation Exercises
Phishing simulations are a more interactive form of cybersecurity training as it allows employers to see that employees have understood their awareness training and are putting the methods learned into practice. Phishing simulations are often conducted internally within a company whereby a fake email is sent to employees containing an attachment, embedded link or a request for personal information.
The idea is to test an employee’s awareness at identifying the key markers that should create suspicion around a dodgy email. It also demonstrates how an employee will react when they receive such an email (i.e. reporting it to management) as phishing scams are one of the most common cyber threats to a business in modern society.
Conclusion
As employees are often on the frontline in a company when it comes to preventing a cyber breach it is essential that a business invests in appropriate cybersecurity training to ensure that everyone within the business has the basic skills of identifying threats and the awareness of the appropriate procedure in dealing with such incidents.
