Importance of Employee Security Training

In today’s day and age, when it comes to securing your company network, you must think beyond technology. Relying on firewalls, anti-virus software, and secure remote connections, such as VPNs, is simply not enough anymore…
Why? Even with all these tools and services in place (and possibly more), you are only 50% protected, at best… Yes, these products and solutions protect your network from being attacked externally. BUT! These products and solutions do not prevent cyber criminals hacking into your system internally.
Why? Because the actions of your employees and those that use your network infrastructure are the greatest risk to your network.
That’s right! It’s not external threats, like economic changes or natural disasters, that are the root cause for cyber security attack. It’s internal threats, or better known as insider threats: it’s your employees!
Employees Are Your Weakest Security Link
You might think, “Employees are smart and trusted individuals, and know how to safely use the Internet.” True, but a single mistake, such as interacting with a phishing scam or sharing personally identifiable information (PII), is all it takes.
You might think, “Well, not all employees have access to an organization’s sensitive and confidential data.” That may be so, but that doesn’t mean they still can’t accidently misuse the organization’s information or install illegitimate software. What’s more is employees with low levels of security are even bigger and easier targets for cyber criminals.
You might think, “Okay, but there are many large businesses with sufficient money, resources, and exceptional cyber security protection, so their employees aren’t a risk at all.” All organizations – no matter size, shape, or industry – are at risk to cyber security attacks, and especially those caused by their very own employees. In fact, there are countless examples of sizable, successful companies whose cyber security attacks are caused by insider attacks. Just last year in 2020, Amazon, Twitter, and Tesla, to name a few, were those some of those companies…
Let’s Talk Statistics
Frightening information, disturbing numbers, and sadly enough, not a whole lot of good news to expect from the coming future. That is… if organizations don’t start taking cybersecurity measures more seriously, starting with their employees.
To give you an idea, below are just a few, key takeaways from a recent study conducted by Cybersecurity Insiders – 2020 Insider Threat Report:
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“58% of organizations consider their monitoring, detecting and responding to insider threats somewhat effective or worse.”
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“68%” of organizations feel extremely to moderately vulnerable to insider attacks.”
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“52% of organizations feel it is more difficult to detect and prevent insider attacks compared to external cyber-attacks.”
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“68% of organizations think insider attacks have become more frequent in the past 12 months.”