Cyber Literacy and Your Staff

We talk a lot on this blog about training and security. There is a reason for that. It can mean the end of your business if you do not take the right precautions!

We hear about new data breaches almost every day. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, people are working from home without the security found in a physical office. Cybercriminals are taking full advantage and are finding new ways to exploit your business!

Did you know

43% of cyber attacks target small business

Source

Since Covid-19, the FBI reported a 300% increase in reported cybercrimes

Source

95% of cybersecurity breaches are due to human error

Source

Cyber Literacy

What is Cyber Literacy? Your IT group can only do so much to protect you. We cannot be there to read every email or validate every web page before it reaches you and your staff. (I guess technically we could, but that would be ridiculously expensive.) But we have some robust policies and software in place to do most of the heavy lifting. Microsoft has an entire unit dedicated to researching and fighting cybercrime.  However, software is not perfect. So, you and your staff are the first line of defense.

Training that first line is crucial to your success against those criminals. Cyber Literacy is just as the name implies. Literacy in cybercrime and knowing how best to detect and prevent breaches.

Recommendations

I recommend that your staff does at least one cybercrime training per month. This training can cover all topics within the cybercrime world, focusing on what your staff should do in case of a detected attack (or attempt at an attack).

Resources

There are lots of online resources. You can sift through online videos, visit websites dedicated to cybercrime articles, or you can hire a service.

Should you decide to take this on yourself, start by researching the top cybercrime trends. From those trends you can figure out which topics should be forefront in beginning your training regime. Once you have identified those trends, then look for training resources.

You can choose to view videos as a group or individually or you can go over articles as a group or send them to your staff inboxes.

Harbor Computer Services Cybercrime and Security Training

As you know, we offer training on all topics related to your electronic devices. Cybercrime training and security training is a hot topic with our clients. This training comes in a couple of different forms.

We offer group training. Generally, we did this on site until about a year ago. We’ve been very successful in conducting most training remotely since then. When training via Teams meeting, each staff member of yours can participate from any location (with Wi-Fi).

Another offering that we have is video training. A select few of our clients have already tried this and it has been highly successful! For an extremely affordable price we set up a campaign through a service that we use. This campaign will send videos to each of your staff member’s inboxes within a specific time frame. When the video hits their inbox, they click on a link in the email that goes to the video. Once the video has been viewed there is a quick quiz covering topics directly from the video. They are required to get each answer correct before it is marked as complete. The entire process for your staff member will be less than 15 minutes. Then, a report is sent to management that shows who participated. This way you can keep up with training with little effort!

Example topics in these training videos include:

  • Phishing scams and how to avoid being a victim
  • Data protection
  • Password Practices
  • Multifactor Authentication
  • Privacy and data classification
  • Common types of data breaches
  • Malware awareness
  • And much more!

Here is a screenshot of one of these videos:

Harbor Computer Services Phishing Simulations

Along with the training videos, this same cost includes phishing simulations. This will send your staff a fake email that looks like it is legitimate. This is a test to see who has been paying attention. Did they click on the links in the email? Did they fill out any info once they clicked on the link?

Once these emails have gone out and your staff has had time to review it they get a score! A report is sent to management to show who clicked, who shared info, and who deleted the email.

This is a perfect test to see if your staff is taking cyber security seriously!

Below is a screenshot of one of these phishing simulations:

As we’ve said many times before, it is impossible for your IT professionals to stop every instance of cybercrime from hitting your company. But there is a LOT that can be done to train your staff as the front line in defense.  Think about what you are currently doing to prevent cybercrime and how knowledgeable your staff is on the topic. Are you refreshing their knowledge periodically? Make sure they know what to do and how to treat a possible attack! A major attack could mean the end of your business. Don’t let that happen!

About Harbor Computer Services

Harbor Computer Services is an IT firm servicing Southeastern Michigan. We work exclusively under contract with our clients to provide technology direction and either become the IT department or provide assistance to the internal IT they already have. We have won many awards for our work over the years, including the worldwide Microsoft Partner of the Year in 2010. Most recently we were recognized as one of the top MSP’s in the nation by ChannelFutures coming in at #40 nationwide. And in 2016 as the top Michigan IT firm for Manufacturing. There are a few simple things that make Harbor Computer Services the best choice for your business. •We are Professionals •We are Responsible •We care about your business

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