Today, cybersecurity has become a necessity as almost any aspect of our lives is digitized. Business owners should pay attention to cybersecurity training as their staff may endanger the company’s private data. In order to prevent cyber attacks, you can educate your employees about possible risks and teach them security practices.
Having security services doesn’t eliminate all dangers, and it’s crucial to apply several methods. Your staff heads the security system of your organization. They can face device loss, phishing, malware, network intrusion, macro or script attacks, neglect software, and system updates, and many more that require an immediate response.
In this article, you will explore the best practices and ideas to increase your staff’s cybersecurity awareness.
How to Train Your Employees
When it comes to staff member training, you should know different practices. You can do it online or in person, depending on circumstances and preferences. Let’s look at cybersecurity training methods. Mind that the way you deliver information should be understandable, relatable, and versatile.
The easiest solution is to buy a ready-made training course that covers different data protection methods. There are online lessons and cybersecurity guides to train employees to deal with fraud.
Another great option is to interview your staff members and teach people what they need. When you show them how to recognize and manage challenges in practice, it will yield better results. If it’s impossible to train every employee personally, use a screen recorder to provide a detailed video guide on how to secure the private data on their devices.
Ideas of What to Focus on During Cybersecurity Training
Here you will find a list of employee training ideas that will enable people to spot suspicious activity and take appropriate data protection measures.
#1 Device Security
Include in the course information on device security both owned by company and employees’ personal phones and computers. Lost devices are one of the main causes of company breaches. When leaving a device in an office or public place, use video capture software to get a suspicious activity report.
Staff members should understand their responsibility for malware protection and know possible intrusion ways. Thus, they need to distinguish devices for personal and corporate usage. Everybody should create a work account that is strictly aimed at company activities. Employees must follow OS and antivirus updates for device security.
#2 Password Security
A strong password is a prerequisite to company data security. Train employees to set cryptic passwords that are difficult to guess. The best option is a password with at least eight characters, including uppercase, lowercase, numerals, and symbols.
It’s essential to perform periodic password changes for a solid security system. Besides, make them aware of the fact that malware protection requires the password is not shared across accounts. You can benefit from password generators that create and remember strong passwords.
#3 Social Engineering
Training web-browsing risks can prevent your company from the most sophisticated cyber attracts. Social engineering attacks target employees’ psychology and are difficult to spot. They try to find sensitive data through manipulation techniques. Fraudsters may ask for help and here the only way to know of an attack is to check a phone number. Use security services and perform a regular virus checklist to track cases of phishing, pretexting, baiting, quid pro quo, and tailgating.
#4 Document Management
Your staff members should be trained for suspicious activity reports in case of viruses, unexplained errors, slow operating, desktop configuration changes, and more). It must be clear for them if a device is endangered and have a step-by-step action plan. Teach employees to recognize alerts and respond to them properly. Require they immediately address your company’s IT team to investigate the threat and manage it efficiently.
#5 Email Security
There are many elements of responsible email usage that ensure data safety. Train the staff to ignore suspicious emails and scams. It’s crucial that they open and reply to emails from senders they know and expect to receive. An unexpected email should always undergo an antivirus check. Besides, your employees need to be prudent with strange file formats, requests, links, download suggestions, etc. Thus, all email attachments must be scanned before opening to avoid cyber fraud.
#6 Computer Resources
Train your employees to safeguard their computers by keeping them in a secure place. Besides, use a cloud backup for all important information so that file copies have a safe location. Having computer resources checked and duplicated reduces risks. It’s possible to download a management tool for computer resources, especially when setting up a new laptop. You will have a clear picture of what’s happening on the device in real-time and detect intrusions. All staff members should be trained for that, so the company is not endangered by any cyber attacks or negligent behavior.
#7 Cybersecurity Breaches Examination
It’s reported that 95% of cybersecurity breaches happen because of human error. They result from a lack of skills and faulty decisions. And here, a powerful training technique is to teach your staff by showing them real cases where unintentional actions and poor attention lead to data breaches. Thus, your employees will see the importance of their prevention measures and awareness.
As an example, we can look at a misdelivery case when the NHS revealed the email addresses of 800 HIV patients. Another popular cybersecurity breach case is patching when fraudsters send patches to solve software vulnerabilities. Therefore, change your company culture and focus on security.
Conclusion
Now you know how important cybersecurity awareness is and can apply the best practices to train the staff. You should encourage them to actively participate in activities aimed at enhancing your company’s security and success. Regular reports and interviews would be a perfect solution to keep people involved.
