Internet hackers are sophisticated, difficult to catch and plentiful in number. To protect your business, you need to teach your employees about internet safety. These four tips will help your employees become aware of what they need to do to minimize security risks to the company’s network.
Engaging in Regular Security Training
While most businesses require new hires to participate in an internet safety training course, seasoned employees may have forgotten what they learned. Scammers, hackers and phishers are constantly inventing new ways to circumvent safety systems. Regular training for internet security helps your employees to be aware of the latest internet and cyber security threats.
Provide Appropriate Training Guides
With the correct material to support employee internet safety, the workplace will run more efficiently. Providing security awareness training guides helps your employees to know what to do when they encounter a hazard. For example, if an employee receives an email with an attachment from an unknown sender, your security guide can explain what to do. The security guide should also include instructions about how to report incidents.
Make Security Personal
Teach your employees that every device accessing the company network has the potential to allow a worm, virus, spyware or malware to get into the system. The Internet of Things, smartphones and an employee’s personal computer can all be ports of entry for security risks. You can also make internet security personal by giving specific examples. One example could be a typical e-commerce transaction. Demonstrate how an employee making an online purchase with a credit card or clicking on a link could allow malware or spyware to infiltrate the network.
Implement Safeguards
Teaching employees about internet safety involves some prompting. When left to their own devices, your employees may not remember to change their passwords frequently, or they might choose passwords that are easy to hack. Your information technology team can implement safeguards such as prompts that require the employee to change their passwords every 30, 60 or 90 days. You can also require that the password be a certain length, be different than their previous password and have a combination of upper and lowercase letters, numbers and symbols.
Internet safety is important to everyone in your company. A single intrusion could cost your business a significant amount in profitability, time and reputation. Keeping your employees up-to-date about internet safety requires ongoing efforts and planning. By providing regular training sessions and updates and implementing automatic safeguards, you can teach your employees how to keep their internet activities as safe as possible.
