The current output of data is roughly 2.5 quintillion bytes a day.
Are you surprised by this data? I surely was, by the phenomenal volume of data being generated. With such huge volume of data,, there arises the increasing responsibility to ensure the proper management and handling of data. This is especially a big pain point to organisations, who own and manage larger chunks of data.
Well, if I have to ask you what is the biggest information security challenge, which the modern day organizations face? Some of you will say it is the new malware or viruses but in my opinion, the biggest threat is to safeguard the weakest link in the information security chain i.e the humans or the users itself. A recent report suggests that human errors caused 28% of data breaches last year. A single error or mismanagement of data from an employee can drop the company from fame to shame apart from causing monetary loss.
What can be the solution here ?
An antivirus, firewall or any other software and hardware structure might be able to give the protection to a good extent, but the larger perspective that we need to understand is that if there is no awareness among the employees i.e if the employees are not properly trained on information security policies, these tools can just act as drivers but cannot ensure a complete solution. While most of the organizations are including Infosec training as a part of their mandatory training calendars very few organizations have effective e-learning modules to train their workforce on Infosec policies. Traditional classroom training continues to be a medium to deliver Infosec training. While I don’t question the effectiveness of a classroom training program on information security, I would like to share the top five benefits of Information Security e-learning (Infosec e-learning) in this blog. For more information on all about information security e-learning, please read my recently published blog on the same.
1.Suitable for training a larger workforce
Be it a small or large, organisations from across the industries mandatorily need to train their workforce on information security. The increasing threats and data breaches are becoming a regular occurrence and it’s high time that organisations compulsory train their workforce on Information Security. This throws a challenge to the L&D Teams or IT teams of the organisation to train a large and diversified workforce simultaneously. For example, a global organization having its workforce spread across different geographies cannot imagine running a traditional mode for training and e-learning on Infosec works out as the best option. It provides flexibility to the organizations to train their employees working in different time zones and locations. Infosec e-learning gives the benefit of scalability to the organization as well as flexibility to the learners.
2. Helps in easy updation of the content
The year 2017 witnessed, a new malware specimen emerge, every 4.2 seconds. That is a dangerous statistics and what makes it more threatening is the difficulty in identifying these malware programs, viruses and other threats as the users are not aware of it. Imagine a situation where a new malware threat has emerged and your employees are not aware of it. How do you safeguard the organizations from such situations and what is the fastest way to equip your employees with the necessary information? The answer is obvious “a quick microlearning video or e-learning on the said topic of new malware”.
Let us look at another example of social engineering, using the medium of sound and hardware devices to hack into the database etc are new forms of threats that have evolved. With a traditional training, it is not practical to conduct a training program every time a new threat arises. But with an effective elearning strategy, it becomes very easy to update your learning content, the organisation can quickly create and add new content and deliver it back to the learners in very less time
3. Facilitates learning by practice and understanding the consequences
Elearning gives the flexibility and option to the learners to learn by understanding the consequences of their actions and choices
For example, a scenario based information security e-learning module can show the learners a scenario of an employee using his USB device on his office desktop without even ensuring that the device is scanned by the antivirus program.
The scenario can further show the scenes of a system crash or a data corruption as the USB had malware or virus in it and the consequent threat or data breach incident arising out of the employee’s action.
Such powerful visuals in the form of scenarios, simulations etc can help the learners to understand the consequence and thus creates the awareness and retention among the learners.
Some other popular benefits of an elearning module on information security are the following –
4. Ensures flexibility to the learners
Learners can access the learning content from anywhere and any device at their convenience. Unlike a classroom training , the learners need not wait for the instructor or the trainer to arrive and start the course in a fixed schedule which eliminates the element of flexibility
5.Tracking of the user assessments and reports
We all know that learning is incomplete without assessments and reports. With elearning modules, the detailed user assessment reports can be easily generated and accessed by LMS administrators and the concerned departments.They can review the users performance from time to time and can keep a track on the user reports which is difficult in a classroom training.
These are some of the benefits of information security e-learning modules. If you are looking to convert your traditional classroom training on info security the elearning way, feel free to contact us for any suggestions and recommendations.
