Cyberattacks should be a concern for any organization working with sensitive information. Hackers have become more sophisticated in their attempts to breach organizations, making it difficult to detect breaches. Organization-wide cybersecurity compliance mitigates the risk of cyberattacks, while providing employees with the tools to recognize attacks before they can infect an organization’s entire network. One of the most difficult parts of cybersecurity is getting employees to adopt security practices. The following are eight methods to facilitate employee cybersecurity compliance.
1. Utilize Shorter Frequent Training Sessions
Employees will be more susceptible to cybersecurity compliance when policies and procedures are written in an easily understandable manner. In addition, giving employees training over multiple shorter sessions as opposed to one long training session, will facilitate widespread adoption of cybersecurity practices.
2. Designate ‘Security Leaders’
As part of an effective compliance program, organizations should have a Chief Security Officer (CSO) that is responsible for ensuring company-wide adoption of cybersecurity practices. CSOs should update cybersecurity practices when there are changes in business operations or new technology being utilized. There should also be ‘security leaders’ designated throughout all departments within the organization to monitor phishing attempts. The ‘security leaders’ should report any issues to the CSO.
3. Frequent Communication Surrounding Cybersecurity
Discussing cybersecurity practices and why they are important in multiple platforms will increase cybersecurity compliance. Updating employees on changes in policies and procedures in company meetings and retraining on changes increase adoption.
4. Gamify the Process
The best way to increase employee engagement is through friendly competition. Organizations can use leaderboards and scorecards to track employees’ progress in their training. Gamification makes a boring topic more exciting. Employees will look forward to cybersecurity training when it is made to be more fun.
5. Solidify Cybersecurity Compliance by Making the Business Case for It
Giving employees insight into how cybersecurity affects business, and in turn affects them, will give them more incentive to adopt cybersecurity compliance. Relatable examples of malware attacks solidify the need for cybersecurity.
6. Make Security Employee-Focused
Focusing on what employees know about cybersecurity and concerns they may have is beneficial. An open dialog allows the team to give feedback on what is working as well as suggestions. Allowing employees to get involved in the process gives a sense of accomplishment that will lead them to implement widespread cybersecurity practices.
7. Explain Why New Security Policies and Procedures Were Implemented
Transparency is the key to cybersecurity compliance. If employees don’t understand why something is being implemented, they are less likely to adhere to policies and procedures.
8. Personalize Cybersecurity Compliance
Showing employees how cybersecurity can affect an employees personal life can have a great impact. Training employees on how to protect themselves and family members from cyberattacks will demonstrate the importance of widespread cybersecurity practices. Additionally, discussing how a company breach can personally affect them will resonate better. Organizations hold personal information on their employees such as bank account numbers, Social Security numbers, and other sensitive information. Publicly traded companies can also show employees how a breach can affect stock prices, leading to a financial loss for both the company and employees.
Adopting robust cybersecurity practices is more important than ever. Cyberattacks have become more frequent in recent years, from the Equifax breach affecting half of the United States population, to healthcare breaches compromising the quality of patient care, cybersecurity compliance should be a top priority for any organization.