When it comes to digital security, companies always keep the latest technologies on first-priority to defend against digital security risks and possible associated threats. The stakeholders often allocate a huge amount of funds and investments to protect their hardware and software but they overlook the entire data securing process and the true importance of having their employees trained in crucial information security areas. While information security training, often referred to as data security training may not alone suffice for securing your data servers at a 100% level, but it creates a sound approach of optimum protection in employees who are a part of cybersecurity teams.
Digital security cannot be only referred to as an IT problem, but it is more of a core-business problem. Meaning that information security awareness and training programs are not only meant for IT managers, they are important for all levels of employees regardless of their job role in an IT firm.
Cybersecurity attacks are increasing day-by-day and it is recorded that ransom-ware attacks have almost increased by 91% last year. And not only ransom-ware attacks are at the true disposal of cyber-attackers, but there are also a couple of other prone breaches that are going to cause massive information security disruptions in the year 2019. While hacks of international corporations’ servers are the most reported attacks this year, small and medium enterprises are said to be on a clear target for the coming year, due to the fact that organizations of these operating scales comprise of the weakest information security databases and backup plans. The year 2019 is all about phishing, botnets, and ransom-ware attacks. As a matter of fact, a survey taken in 2017 reveals that about ¼ of the businesses aren’t really aware of phishing, and 25% of the total population isn’t knowledgeable about ransom-ware attacks, while the rest of the businesses aren’t sure of as to what level of damages a point-of-sale malware could cause.
Necessities of An Information Security Training Awareness Program
The advantages of getting your employees trained in the information security domain are enormous, but the following list of benefits are some of the most crucial elements that you shouldn’t overlook:
- Mitigation of digital security threats.
- Cost-efficiency in terms of having a more secure database which eliminates the consequences after being hit by digital security threats.
- Lower insurance premiums.
- A greater level of confidence in day-to-day operations.
- Elimination of high reputational-risk.
Phishing and Social Hijacking
Emails and social profiles are the first two open targets to cyber attackers. These are the two areas where a company needs to adopt a more robust approach. The attacks that are hit on social profiles are referred to as ‘Social Engineering’. It is a set of different hacking activities through which cyber attackers gain access to user profiles and administration of business pages. Likewise, phishing gives cyber attackers the access to login credentials which are then used to incur financial losses to an entity.
The reason why these types of attacks are most common and the primary weapon to any cyber attacker is that they appear very credible and authentic, but the fact is, they are actually disguised. With the help of information security training and certifications such as CISSP and CASP, your employees could easily identify these severe attacks and define roadmaps to prevent them from affecting your sensitive information.
Access Level Controls and Device Security
You as an organization should be able to understand the true importance of access level controls. Your clients sometimes require privileged user access to their servers in order to perform certain tasks. Thus it is very imperative that each of your employees knows what level of access they are granted to conduct a particular task. And apart from just that, employees should be knowledgeable about password lengths, complexity, and backups to keep their access levels secure.
Your IT professionals must be technically sound of network connections they’re using at the workplace. Despite of having their entire data encrypted in their official devices (given by your company), it’s quite possible that the data they transfer through other means is not encrypted which would, of course, lead to certain vulnerabilities. Your employees may also, at times, be using public networks other than workplaces. This normal activity could prove to be a major security concern for your organization. Your employees need to be aware of the potential risks associated with the usage of public networks. Moreover, employees tend to bring their own personal devices at workplaces which puts your business at high risk of being compromised. This creates a quick gateway to your business information and data for cyber attackers. Perhaps, smartphones and tablets are an easy target to cyber attackers as compared to laptops and notebooks, due to the fact that they do not have any endpoint protection layer pre-installed.
Thus, it’s very necessary for all your employees to protect their mobile devices so that these cyber attackers don’t get access to your business information. A data security training program will let your employees be aware of these possible vulnerabilities and also acquaint them with best practices to avoid such calamities.
Requirement of Law
One big reason to enroll your field staff in information security training programs is that you need to be assured of following all the regulations that the law imposes. Organizations such as financial institutes, government institutes, and various healthcare institutes are required by the law to provide their network teams, an adequate level of digital security training.
An ideal information security awareness training program will cover a lot of different aspects that cyber attackers are more prone to exploiting to collect sensitive business information such as passwords and other login credentials. Digital security awareness has now become an important and integral part of any organization regardless of its industry and operating scale. Not only does it highlight the human-errors and makes your employee reactive to information security threats, but an information security training program is also designed to provide employees with a more preventive and proactive approach.