Provided by Prostream South Africa.

In light of the well-documented history of human error leading to breaches, organizations cannot afford to ignore the importance of educating their employees about online dangers. Employee cyber awareness is one of the best ways to prevent data violation in any business. The responsibility for cyber security rests with everyone in an organization, but the leadership remains vital. When the CEO of a company takes cyber awareness seriously, this will resonate throughout the organization, helping to boost security awareness. You can prepare your employees easily by following these steps:

Step 1: Understand the threats your enterprise faces.

Any cyber security awareness program will fail unless you understand your cyber security ecosystem. Know your business, your assets, and your threats. Although every organization faces a different threat landscape, some common threats include phishing emails, malware links, and ransomware. You must first understand your company’s cyber vulnerabilities to build a robust cyber infrastructure, that includes your employees.

Step 2: Make cyber security an organizational culture.

Next, make cyber security a part of every employee’s responsibilities. A strong organizational culture is a critical component of cyber security for an organization. IT departments and cybersecurity specialists no longer have the sole responsibility of protecting enterprises from cyber threats. Instead, there is a target for every gadget in the organization. To ensure the safety of the company’s devices, networks, and websites’ safety, all employees must be protected from cyber threats. For an organization to avoid threats that can cause damage, employees need to understand things such as strong passwords, network security, bad links, and phishing emails.

Step 3: Training, coach & mindfulness.

Malicious insiders threaten enterprise security, but it is most often caused by careless and innocent employee mistakes. Malware, ransomware, phishing, and black hat attacks are all in part the result of carelessness. For example, phishing emails aren’t always obvious to employees, and they click on them without being aware that they are attracting social engineering scams. Training and educating employees about security mindfulness will help them avoid becoming avenues for threat penetration once you know your organization’s potential threats and risk profile.

Step 4: Gain executive buy-in.

The first step toward successful cyber security awareness is at the top. It isn’t enough to simply educate and train people about awareness. All aspects of cyber security should be led by the executive and embraced by the organization. Explain to executives the importance of awareness and watchfulness and why data security is so important to the company. Implementing all the other cyber security programs will be easy once executives buy into the idea.

Step 5: Continuous cyber security

There is no such thing as a ‘finished’ project when it comes to cyber security awareness. Keeping cyber security up to date must be a continuous process. The digital age has brought about a constant evolution of everything, including cyber threats. The evolution of technology is creating more sophisticated threats every day, and today’s malware isn’t like malware 20 years ago. Your attackers will arrive as soon as you relax your cyber security awareness program. Stay up-to-date on technology and threat protection techniques by regularly updating your awareness and infrastructure.

Conclusion

In light of the rise in cyber crime, companies must take essential steps to protect their data. Employee cyber security awareness is one of these steps. Providing your IT department with cyber security specialists is essential, but their ability to protect your organization depends on your employees’ consciousness and awareness.