Many companies offer cybersecurity training, but they typically don’t hold it as often as they should. In fact, it’s probably been a long while since you’ve last attended a cybersecurity awareness training session, which means that the cybersecurity solutions you learned at the time are likely to be obsolete now since the landscape is constantly changing.
Most people struggle to remember information they learned a month ago or even what they had for breakfast this morning. Yet, companies often drag their feet in carrying out training sessions to keep their staff updated. For this reason, it’s essential to train your employees in cybersecurity tips to stop malicious attacks from shuttering your organisation. However, you may be wondering how often you’ll need to hold these sessions. Here’s what you need to know:
The Best Schedule For Cybersecurity Awareness Training
According to the Advanced Computing Systems Association (USENIX), companies should hold cybersecurity training every four to six months. They carried out a study in which they observed employees who had undergone security awareness training on identifying phishing attacks. They were asked to pinpoint phishing emails at different intervals four to twelve months after the training.
The researchers found that employees could still spot phishing emails quickly four months after the initial training. However, after six months, they started forgetting what they had learned. Another study, the 2020 State of the Phish Report, revealed that training frequency fluctuated wildly among organisations. Some held training only once a year, while others had them as often as twice a month. However, with these findings and depending on your organisation’s needs, you may want to use the four-to-six-month timeline as a starting point.
The Importance of Frequent Training
Security awareness training is crucial for reducing the risk of devastating cyber attacks on your business. These training sessions can reportedly lower the incidence of cyber-attacks like a data breach by 70 percent. Despite this, 62 percent of companies do not hold frequent cybersecurity training.
Cybersecurity training can protect a business in many ways. It prevents ransomware from taking over an organisation’s infrastructure, resulting in 3 days of downtime on average. Additionally, over half of the organisations were hit by ransomware last year. Due to a lack of cybersecurity training, a reported 31 percent of organisations grappled with data loss, and 82 percent encountered downtime due to a cyberattack. Even with these alarming figures, the report found that 55 percent of organisations still do not offer awareness training frequently. With the global average total cost of a data breach at $3.86 million in 2020, cybersecurity training is necessary for a business’s survival.
How to Train Your Employees Effectively
Deploying effective security training involves delivering the correct information in the most appealing, appropriate formats. Your training program must inform employees of the various threats they can encounter both at work and on their personal devices. Since the scope of threats is so vast, your cybersecurity and intelligence training must cover all bases instead of focusing on one topic, like identifying phishing attempts.
For example, educating your employees on proper password management and not oversharing on social media can keep you and your company safe. Conveying this information through interactive examples and videos will impart the message most effectively. It will also help to use entertainment and humor in the training process, which will increase your employees’ enthusiasm and willingness to learn.
Frequent cybersecurity and intelligence training will keep your employees alert for cyber-attacks and phishing attempts. All it takes is one to compromise your company’s sensitive information and crash your operations, with extensive downtime taking valuable sales opportunities with it. By holding numerous cybersecurity awareness training sessions throughout the year, you’ll equip your employees with the skills and tools they need to protect their and the company’s information.
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