Phishing Awareness Presentations As A Part Of Employee Phishing Training Programs
With more organizations functioning online, emails have become the primary mode of communication. Emails are convenient but at the same time, can be a vulnerable mode of communication as well. Hackers and cybercriminals use this medium of communication to infiltrate into organizational network systems to create havoc. Hence, it becomes imperative to educate their front-desk employees about the dangers of phishing. Phishing awareness presentations should help in this matter.
How Can Employee Phishing Training Help?
The front-desk employees are the first people who access emails sent to the company’s inbox. Hackers use emails to send their malicious content. Yes, the company’s security systems may have spam email identifiers installed that can handle spam emails. Nevertheless, some of the phishing emails can sneak through the defenses and lodge into the email inbox. A heedless employee could unwittingly open the email message and click on the spurious links or download the malicious attachment. It could set up a chain reaction, thereby affecting all the computers attached to the central server. The business thus ends up compromising on its confidential data. Therefore, educating the front-desk employee is of paramount importance.
How Do You Provide Phishing Email Training For Employees?
Employees should be aware of the smallest of loopholes that hackers could exploit. It will only be possible if the information security teams impart the right kind of phishing email training for employees. One of the best ways to train employees is for the IT security teams to phish their employees. It will keep the employees on their guard all the time and have them lookout for the smallest signs of phishing. Many organizations all over the world use this method, also known as phishing simulation training.
Employee phishing training should be made compulsory for all the employees in an office. They should be made aware that they are the front line of defense. The hackers would always look out for vulnerabilities among them to gain access to the computer networks of the organization. Educating the employees could help make them vigilant, thereby looking out for the smallest signs of infiltration.
These training modules should consist of phishing awareness presentations where the experts from the industry explain the modus operandi (habit of working) of hackers all around the world. The employees should know how to spot phishing attempts. These phishing awareness presentations should distribute phishing training PDF files that the employees can store on their computers for ready reference anytime.
Another way of building up interest in the employees is to conduct competitions amongst the employees as to who is more adept in identifying phishing emails. These contests could have incentives that could spur the employee to show greater interest in these phishing awareness presentations and thereby, help the company in the long run.
Phishing Tips For Employees
The employee phishing training modules should share phishing tips for employees and teach them how to identify the red flags in an email. These tips can help in improving the overall awareness levels of the employees. Such tips should be part of phishing awareness presentations.
- Never trust an email solely based on the sender’s information unless you know who the sender is. One should understand that email spoofing is one of the most common methods used by cybercriminals to send phishing emails. Email spoofing occurs when the phisher uses a legitimate company name as the email sender, whereas the email address underneath would be a random one. The recipient would not know the details of the actual sender unless he/she hovers the mouse over the email address. This type of spoofing is prevalent on mobile devices because the email address of the sender is always hidden in an email message received on the phone.
- Never fall for any enticing offer sent through an email. The concept of a free lunch is no longer present anywhere. Similarly, one should also not trust any threatening email. Such emails can create panic among users and force them to commit mistakes. One should verify the contents of the email from reliable sources before reacting to it.
- Hackers often get personal when trying to target vulnerable people in your organization. As an employee, you should remember that organizations always address you by your first name. It should make you all the more cautious because it could be challenging to identify which email is genuine and which is a phishing attempt. Therefore, being on guard is the only way out for you.
- Be careful of the links you encounter in an email. It could direct to your internet banking page. You should check out for the https before the website address. Phishing links will not have the https but direct you to an HTTP website that is not a secure one. A little vigilance can save the day for you.
- Phishing can take place through an email attachment, as well. It is not always that the links are dangerous. The email attachment could be as hazardous as the links. Downloading unsolicited attachments is a sure way of inviting trouble.
Final Words
It does not cost much for the hacker to try and phish for victims. However, the unsuspecting victim could lose their earnings of a lifetime if they are not on their guard. Therefore, phishing awareness presentations are critical to the security of any business organization. An attentive employee can make a vital difference to the fortunes of the business organization.
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