Security awareness training
Security awareness training is an organization-wide endeavor aimed at assisting employees in recognizing and evading cyber threats within the workplace. It serves as a vital element in robust cybersecurity measures, preventing data breaches resulting from human errors and internal threats. Sometimes the training can be “just-in-time” and in-context, which means it has the ability to start training in response to an employee violating a security policy or falls victim to a phishing attack.
Best practices
Some of the security awareness best practices are to customize the content to each level in the organization, make it an ongoing process, content is reviewed and updated frequently to account for changes in the cyber threat landscape.
Benefits
The benefits of the awareness training are to protect against data breaches. Additionally, training employees to detect threats minimizes risk of phishing and ransomware. It also ensures that your organization stays compliant with most of the security standards.
Content
Training materials typically include reading modules, videos, on-hand exercises, and testing to ensure effectiveness. All lessons are to engage users so that they get the most out of their sessions. It should cover topics such as phishing, password protection, safe social media usage, social engineering, physical security, public Wi-Fi safety, and remote work.
Testing users
The awareness program should be testing users with real-world phishing emails and social engineering scenarios to help them identify threats. The example exercises should simulate real-world attacks. The test reports will identify employees who need still need additional training. After the security awareness training, the team will send feedback survey questions to managers, executives, and employees for improvements.
Cost
The cost of an effective security awareness training program will vary depending on the size of your organization. The cost of training is definitely much less than a successful cyber breach which costs a company a lot in revenue, customer confidence and public image.