Intro
Every day, a huge number of workers around the world are led to the tricks of phishing scammers. This is becoming an increasing problem for companies around the world as their data becomes vulnerable. For companies, this can lead not only to significant losses but to the loss of reputation too.
Many businesses have a department responsible for cybersecurity, so CEOs hold the cybersecurity team fully responsible for data and security breaches. However, all company employees should be held accountable for this.
Education is key
Therefore, today, the highest priority task is to train employees in the basic rules of cybersecurity. Specialized employees in this area must not only explain what the threat is but also show what is at stake if they become victims of phishing. In addition, trained professionals must transfer knowledge to other employees on how to act in various situations that threaten the company's cybersecurity.
Every employee of the company should be aware. We are talking about company management, in-house teams, and interns. In addition, if your company is involved in staff augmentation and attracts remote professionals, then their training should also come to the fore.
Show your colleagues what it looks like
A non-cyber-savvy worker may have a hard time recognizing what a phishing attack looks like. You can talk endlessly about what it is, how it can look, and how to deal with it, but the practice is always much better than theory. One simulated phishing attack will replace hours of lectures.
Your employees must fully understand how they can become a victim of phishing and how devastating this attack can be for the entire company, as well as for customers. Because of this, you need to simulate an attack and send malicious emails from third-party sources as well as internal company sources. All employees should be aware that a phishing attack may be on behalf of a colleague they know well.
You can do the following:
- Carry out a simulated attack without warning other employees;
- Compose bodies of emails in such a way that, on the one hand, it looks unsuspicious, and on the other hand, so that employees can think about the relevance of the letter, find atypical grammatical and syntactical errors, and so on;
- Send emails to employees from external sources, as well as on behalf of colleagues they know.
Give explanations and show what to do
Based on your research after a simulated attack, you will be able to collect information and present it to your colleagues. You can provide research statistics and show how vulnerable your company's security is due to the actions of employees.
After that, you can move on to give details on how to be more vigilant. You do not need to talk about all the intricacies of cybersecurity and use the vocabulary that other employees may simply not understand.
Instead, you need to do the following:
- Give real examples and talk about the consequences;
- Tell them about other popular attacks that can also harm the company;
- Tell them about how to distinguish a normal email from a malicious one;
- Don't give a lot of technical information, instead speak in all familiar language and use understandable terminology for non-experts.
Conclusion
The cybersecurity department will not be able to save the company from failure if other employees are not aware of simple phishing security measures. Companies need to provide high-quality and understandable phishing prevention training to all employees, without exception. This applies to both senior management and remote employees and even interns. Try to make training so that employees remember all the information and know how to avoid becoming victims of phishing attacks.