Cyber Security Awareness Month 2024: A Focus on Cybersecurity Training

For any job, training is an essential element that equips you with the skills and knowledge to manage tasks effectively. This training helps you to automatically deal with unexpected obstacles and situations to the best of your ability. This same logic applies when it comes to securing your network and data against cyber threats. Cybersecurity training is an essential part of any company’s cyber resilience toolkit and allows companies and individuals to stay prepared for the worst at all times.

In this blog article, we take a look at the importance of cybersecurity training as a critical feature of 2024’s Cyber Security Awareness Month. We also look at the importance, benefits, and key components of cybersecurity training as well as the challenges and best practices for its implementation. For now, let’s take a closer look at the annual campaign that pushes companies to introspect on their cybersecurity posture.

Cyber Security Awareness Month 2024: Secure Our World

Since 2004, October has been declared Cyber Security Awareness Month by the US President, the National Cybersecurity Alliance, and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency (CISA). 2024 marks the 21st year of the campaign that is dedicated to raising awareness about the importance of cybersecurity for public and private sectors. The collaborative effort has become a global phenomenon with governments and industries around the world actively participating in elevating cybersecurity mindfulness.

The theme for 2024’s Cyber Security Awareness Month is “Secure Our World” – a campaign aimed at reminding the public that there are simple, daily practices that can be used to protect yourself, your family, and your business from online threats. The theme focuses on four main elements to effectively ensure cybersecurity – using stronger passwords, switching on Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA), recognizing and reporting phishing scams, and regularly updating software.

While these are all constructive points, none of these best practices can be put into place correctly without the right cybersecurity training in place. Now, let’s try to understand the current digital landscape and the cyber threats that make cybersecurity training such a critical need in today’s society.

The Growing Cyber Threat Landscape

2024 has been a year of massive technological advancements which in turn means that it has been a year of massively evolved cyber threats. The growing shift to remote work environments has opened up a larger attack surface for companies as more people are expanding their networks to include often unprotected personal devices. This has created security gaps that can be leveraged by hackers to steal data, spread malware, and execute ransomware attacks.

Another trend taking hold this year has been the increasingly worrying use of generative AI in the workplace. While Artificial Intelligence can be useful for some tasks, many companies do not know how to effectively use the technology. A recent survey noted that while 65% of the respondents use generative AI, 3 in 4 non-leading businesses still lack an enterprise-wide roadmap for the technology. It should be noted that the use of AI has been tremendously effective in the design of cybersecurity products and has allowed for automatic threat detection. However, the double-edged reality of AI is that hackers can also use it to create malware and automate cyber-attacks.

Generally, these trends make the digital landscape more difficult to navigate without proper cybersecurity training. To elaborate further on this point, let’s have a look at some sobering statistics that should spur any company into investing in proper cybersecurity training immediately:

• Cyber security awareness training leads to a 70% reduction in security-related risks in 2023. (KeepnetLabs)
• In 2023, 70% of data breaches involved the human element. (Verizon)
• 36% of employees believe they have made a workplace mistake that has compromised security in the last 12 months. (Tessian)
• 1 out of every 8 employees will accidentally share information on a phishing site. (InfosecInstitute)
• Global cybercrime costs are expected to grow to US$ 10.5 trillion by 2025. (CybersecurityVentures)
• Users who have undergone phishing awareness training are 30% less likely to click on a phishing link. (KeepnetLabs)
• 60% of small companies go out of business within six months of falling victim to a data breach or cyberattack. (CitizensBank)

While these facts might be terrifying, it’s crucial to know that you have the power to prevent your company and staff members from becoming another statistic of cybercrime. Effective cybersecurity training can effectively reduce the risk of cyber-attacks and help in recovery. We’ll now elaborate on the importance of cybersecurity awareness in the long run for both you and your company.

Importance of Cybersecurity Awareness

Cyber Security Awareness Month is a crucial campaign that highlights the importance of being prepared in a dynamic digital landscape. While human error is inevitable, the right cybersecurity training and knowledge can drastically improve your chances of avoiding cyber threats in the future. Cybersecurity awareness is critical in preventing data breaches and ransomware attacks by educating staff members about the dangers of malware and how to spot phishing scams a mile away. This also ensures that your company stays compliant with data regulations and laws – preventing hefty penalties, reputational damage, and legal problems.

Cybersecurity awareness also creates a culture of security that prioritizes cyber hygiene and personal responsibility – leading to a more resolute, equipped, and responsive team. This ultimately creates a more cohesive and proactive workforce which will in turn also boost productivity, worker retention, and general employee well-being. Focusing on cybersecurity awareness further strengthens customer relations and proves that your company takes cyber threats seriously – improving customer trust and attracting more customers. With all this talk about cybersecurity training, let’s get a better understanding of what exactly that concept entails.

What Is Cybersecurity Training

Cybersecurity training can be defined as the ongoing process of educating employees about cyber threats and then training them to respond efficiently, effectively, and proactively toward them. This requires resources, skills development classes, and dedicated time to learning about the latest cyber-attack trends and methods – ensuring that each employee is equipped with the correct understanding to respond to cyber threats as they happen. It’s important to note that cybersecurity awareness training is an organization-wide initiative meant for every member of the company - regardless of whether they’re in the IT department or not. This is because cyber-attacks and phishing scams will target anyone within the company to gain access to the network.

Companies often provide cybersecurity training workshops or courses that align with their specific incident response plans – this means that every employee will know exactly what to do, who to contact, and how to respond if they encounter suspicious files or activity. This drastically improves the chances of mitigating cyber threats before they can do any damage and isolating the malware or files ahead of time. We can now delve further into some of the many benefits of cybersecurity training.

Benefits of Cybersecurity Training

Investing in cybersecurity awareness training might seem like an unnecessary task for many companies, but it could be the one choice you make that saves your business from a cyber-attack. Additionally, let’s look at some of the main advantages of cybersecurity training that you stand to benefit from:

1. Reduced Risk of Cyber-Attacks: Naturally, implementing cybersecurity training will result in fewer cyber threats to your company. With employees being prepared and educated, they are less likely to click on suspicious links to malware or fall for phishing scams and social engineering attacks.
2. Lucrative Return on Investment: Many companies might assume that cybersecurity training awareness programs are a waste of money and time. However, evolving cyber threats are becoming increasingly difficult to avoid and can be extremely costly to recover from – if recovery is even an option. According to Statista, the estimated annual cost of cybercrime worldwide will reach US$ 15.63 trillion by 2029. Fortunately, cybersecurity training provides a substantial ROI by elevating employee skillsets and boosting productivity. As employees become more skilled at identifying risks through this training, they can work with greater confidence and efficiency, which in turn lowers the chances of security incidents that could hinder productivity.
3. Creating a Culture of Security: As we’ve mentioned before, cybersecurity training is crucial to creating a culture of security within the working environment that focuses on proper cyber hygiene and taking responsibility. This fosters a more unified and prepared workforce and mentality.
4. Amplifying Cybersecurity Technology: Cybersecurity platforms are critical in today’s digital age, however, without consistent and reliable human input, these technologies cannot be useful. Cybersecurity training includes educating staff on how to use firewalls, antivirus software, and other cybersecurity programs installed to protect your network.
5. Regulatory Compliance: By adhering to cybersecurity training, your workforce also ensures that your company adheres to the data regulations and policies put in place.
6. Boosted Reputation: Cyber Security Awareness Month is the ideal time for a company to focus on cybersecurity training in a public campaign. This provides positive PR for your company and demonstrates social responsibility to customers that you are prepared, proactive, and committed.

There are many ways that a comprehensive cybersecurity training program can benefit your company, but it ideally boils down to protection against cyber threats. Now, to understand cybersecurity training further, let’s look at some of the core components that make it effective.

Key Components of Effective Cybersecurity Training

It’s easy to simply state that a cybersecurity training plan needs to be put in place for a company’s protection. However, there are specific key components of cybersecurity training that need to be present to effectively defend an organization from all types of cyber threats. These are some of the key elements of cybersecurity training to consider:

1. Phishing and Social Engineering Awareness: These are two of the most common methods that threat actors use to infiltrate information employees. Posing as a trustworthy colleague, acquaintance, or organization, these attacks rely on naivety or carelessness to lure a victim into providing sensitive information or network access. Cybersecurity training teaches employees how to identify, report, and avoid these types of attacks in real-time.
2. Incident Response Planning: Cyber-attacks are an unfortunate but sometimes inevitable reality for many businesses. However, an efficient and effective Incident Response Plan will guide employees through recovery and remediation tasks. Your cybersecurity training should include the creation of an incident response plan that indicates clear roles and responsibilities, a process for reporting incidents, and procedures for containing and mitigating the impact of an attack.
3. Password Management: Password security is a crucial element in cybersecurity training. Employees should be taught how to create strong passwords, regularly change them, and invest in using a password manager. Strong and varying passwords need to be used for different applications - from email accounts and secure data files to social media and physical devices.
4. Policy Development: Your organization further needs to develop and enforce policies as part of cybersecurity training. These policies should cover access control, incident response plans, and data protection regulations while also being updated regularly and accessible across the company.
5. Remote Work Best Practices: Since the pandemic, remote work has spiked drastically across all sectors. While some companies choose hybrid working environments as well, remote working does pose a cybersecurity risk when employees rely on unprotected personal devices to access company networks. Cybersecurity training should include remote working safety practices – including updating security on personal devices and avoiding open Wi-Fi networks for work.
6. Data and Record Management: The management and recording of data are crucial for a business to securely back up important files. Cybersecurity training needs to involve best practices for monitoring and managing company data securely.
7. Cloud Security Awareness: As cloud environments grow in popularity, your team must know how to manage and monitor security for cloud-based applications and programs.
8. Technical Awareness Measures: For a company to fully enact cybersecurity training, its workforce needs to be familiar with all the technical security platforms being used. This ensures that workers can monitor platforms, update software, and follow proper installation protocols as needed.

While these may seem like simple steps to building up a formidable cybersecurity training program, there are many challenges that a company might encounter in this venture as well.

Challenges in Implementing Cybersecurity Training

Cybersecurity training is an essential element for comprehensive protection. However, the concept may seem foreign and unnecessary to many people within the company and you may face some resistance to implementing effective cybersecurity training. Let’s go through some of the potential challenges you might face on this journey and how to mitigate them effectively.

• Resistance to Change: Oftentimes, employees might feel reluctant to shift their perspective and implement cybersecurity practices due to the difficulties of change. Staff may feel uncomfortable having to learn new skills and about new concepts. This can be resolved by creating an inviting and encouraging environment to learn and by reinforcing the idea of personal responsibility in the age of growing cyber threats.
• Difficulty Retaining Interest: While you may provide cybersecurity training programs and workshops, it might be difficult to grab the interest of your employees and ensure that they pay attention. This can be remedied by creating exciting interactive exercises and visual presentations that grab attention – this can include trivia games, cybersecurity simulations, or incentives for completing training.
• Keeping Content Updated: This may be one of the most challenging aspects for many companies – especially ones that are not IT-centric. Your cybersecurity training program needs to make use of the latest trends, cyber threats, and technologies available. With cyber threats constantly evolving, this can be a tedious task. However, you can implement continuous training programs that ask workers to return after a few weeks for updated content. You could also make use of training programs provided by cybersecurity vendors who send out a group of experts to educate your staff with the latest and most accurate content.
• Overwhelming Administrative Tasks: Cybersecurity training programs require a lot of planning, tracking, and management to pull off regularly. This can be a difficult task for many administrators to deal with on top of regular business tasks. Make this easier by using ready-made cybersecurity training programs or outsourcing help from cybersecurity vendors in your area.
• Employees Forgetting Training: It’s human to forget and employees will sometimes have difficulty remembering complex concepts and cybersecurity training after some time. To combat this, you need to ensure that your training is broken up into easily digestible chunks of information over a longer period. It’s also crucial to remember that your cybersecurity training is continuous and that there will always be something new to learn about – so try to create monthly sessions that keep memories fresh and skills sharp.

While these challenges may seem daunting for many organizations, it’s important to note the critical need for cybersecurity training in today’s digital landscape. Moving forward, we’ll now go on to list some of the best practices that can further help in creating a comprehensive cybersecurity training program.

Best Practices for Cybersecurity Training

Cybersecurity training might seem like a tedious task that gets in the way of regularly scheduled work to many employees. This is why it’s up to organizations themselves to create an encouraging, comfortable, and constructive environment for cybersecurity training to flourish. Here are some best practices that will help your company in creating a better cybersecurity training program:

1. Respond to threats immediately. Engaging a response team whose responsibility it is to enact the incident response plan and isolate the event.
2. Utilize interactive training methods. Try to make programs interactive so they don’t sound like monotonous speeches about safety online. Try to engage with employees by asking and answering questions.
3. Follow the four main steps of 2024’s Cyber Security Awareness Month. This includes stronger passwords, enabling Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA), recognizing and reporting phishing scams, and regularly updating software.
4. Ensure everyone is involved. A common mistake companies make is focusing only on IT personnel or lower ranks when doing cybersecurity training. However, every employee in the company – including the higher-ups – is at risk and needs to be involved in the training program.
5. Run phishing simulation tests. This involves sending out fake phishing emails and seeing how each employee responds. Incentives and rewards can also be given out to those who respond correctly.
6. Create your company’s own Cyber Security Awareness Month campaign. Advertise it on social media to gain more traction - this will encourage employee participation while spreading the idea that your company takes cybersecurity seriously.

These tips and tricks will go a long way in ensuring that your team’s cybersecurity training is effective and comprehensive. However, your organization needs more than that to fight the evolved cyber threats making their rounds today and needs to rely on a cybersecurity vendor as well to fortify your security.

A Comprehensive Cybersecurity Approach

Cybersecurity training is an essential part of a comprehensive cybersecurity approach and should be prioritized by all employees. However, to fully protect your network and company, you need to partner with dependable cybersecurity vendors who are experts in the field and can seamlessly provide the essential tools, skills, and knowledge to maintain a complete cybersecurity structure.

Sangfor Technologies is a leading cybersecurity and IT infrastructure vendor that supplies enhanced, elevated, and affordable solutions that would complement and amplify cybersecurity training. These innovative platforms are user-friendly and come with overarching support from expert teams that are ready to assist you and your company at every turn. Some of the advanced and easy-to-use cybersecurity products available from Sangfor today include:

• Sangfor’s Endpoint Secure provides a modern Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) that combines antivirus, Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR), and endpoint management capabilities into a single solution.
• Sangfor Network Secure is the world’s first Next Generation Firewall to combine AI Technology, Cloud Threat Intelligence, NG-WAF, IoT Security, and SoC Lite. It seamlessly eliminates over 99% of external threats at the network perimeter.
• Additionally, Sangfor’s Anti-ransomware platform is the only security solution that addresses the entire life cycle of ransomware attacks while using AI and the synergy between Network Secure and Endpoint Secure to detect and block ransomware attacks in just 3 seconds.
• Lastly, Sangfor Security GPT is the groundbreaking innovation that merges Generative AI with advanced cybersecurity to enhance detection accuracy and operational efficiency. The platform speeds up investigation, enables proactive threat hunting, and streamlines incident responses through simple chat-based interactions - harnessing data from over 20,000 real-world devices and constantly learning and evolving to stay at the forefront of security detection and investigation.

Moving further into Cyber Security Awareness Month, organizations need to actively take responsibility for cybersecurity training and educate themselves on how to reinforce their workforce to stay prepared for evolving cyber threats as they come. Contact Sangfor today for information on enhancing cloud infrastructure and cybersecurity or visit www.sangfor.com to learn more.

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