Why Security Awareness Training is Important

The Importance of Security Awareness

I started off by reading an article today on how CloudFlare and Twilio were phished and breached. They required that all of their employees have Multi-Factor Authentication enabled, and yet the attackers still got in. How?

https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2022/08/phishers-breach-twilio-and-target-cloudflare-using-workers-home-numbers/?source=post_page—–f515c1d56e56——————————–

TLDR: the attackers created a website clone and sent out a phishing email. They waited for the individuals to fall for it. When the users clicked on the email, they were directed to the attacker’s domain where they entered their credentials. The hackers were on standby and automatically entered the credentials on the legitimate domain. This triggered the 2FA to go off. The user entered the MFA code on the attacker’s website and the hacker entered it on the legitimate service’s website immediately. This allowed them to circumvent the MFA process and breach a few accounts.

What does this show? It shows the importance of SAT (Security Awareness Training). The bad guys are going to figure out a way in and it’s up to the weakest link in the chain, the user, to help prevent them from coming in.

Security awareness training is a critical component of your overall security strategy. It can help employees to identify and avoid phishing traps, teach them about the importance of proper password hygiene, and help them learn to spot a malicious link in an email or on a website. It’s important that you don’t overload employees with information — but instead focus on giving them just enough information so they can make informed decisions about their online activity.

Security awareness training is a critical component of your overall security strategy.

It’s the first line of defense against cyberattacks and other types of attacks, but it also helps employees be on the same page with each other and make sure they are aware of the latest threats and tools available to them.

Security awareness training should be carried out by someone who knows what they’re talking about — someone who also knows how to get results from those who participate in it. If you want to achieve maximum impact from your efforts, consider hiring an expert as a one-on-one instructor for your team or department.

There are software out there, like KnowBe4 that have SAT implemented into their system. You set the users and the frequency and roll it out automatically.

It can help employees to identify and avoid phishing traps.

The first step in gaining access to your network is to get employees to open an email or text message with a link. If they do, it’s likely that they’ll be taken down the path of phishing traps.

Security awareness training helps employees recognize these types of scams and avoid them by identifying when someone is asking for sensitive information through social media interfaces like Facebook or Twitter, as well as via email messages that appear legitimate but could be fake.

It helps employees learn to spot a malicious link in an email or on a website.

The last thing you want is for your employees to fall prey to phishing emails, which are designed to steal personal information. In fact, a recent survey found that 73 percent of employees believe they’ve fallen victim to a phishing attack in the past year and one-third said they’ve received an email asking them for private information such as passwords or credit card numbers.

If you’re worried about your employees falling victim to malicious links on websites or emails sent by hackers trying to get into your network, then security awareness training is key.

It’s important that you don’t overload employees with information.

You should not overload your employees with information. Don’t give them so much that they are overwhelmed, or don’t understand what you’re trying to teach them. Also, be careful not to overwhelm them with too much information that’s not related at all to security awareness training and its importance for everyone who works for your company — even those who may not know it yet.

It’s important that you don’t overload employees with information in a way that no one remembers it after the fact; this could lead them down the path of self-sabotage if they feel like they’ve learned something but can’t apply it when needed most (which is often).

With security awareness training, you can make sure that more people in your organization are on the same page when it comes to cybersecurity fundamentals.

Security awareness training is an essential part of any organization’s cybersecurity efforts. It helps to ensure that all members of your team are on the same page when it comes to fundamental cybersecurity practices, including:

  • understanding how their devices work and how they can be compromised;
  • knowing what types of attacks might be possible against their environment and how they might respond; and
  • knowing how to report suspicious activity.

Conclusion

When it comes to cybersecurity, security awareness training can be a game changer for any organization. When your employees know what to look for and how to spot potential threats in real time, you’re more likely to avoid being taken advantage of by hackers or cybercriminals. That’s why it’s so important that you provide regular training sessions so everyone gets the same message from their supervisors and managers on how best practice should be followed when using technology at work (and outside).

If you’re still worried about MFA breaches, take a look at FIDO2-compliant security keys. This should help step up your game in securing your environment.

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