Best cybersecurity onboarding practices

Why should cybersecurity training be a part of onboarding? To put it plainly, getting hacked can lead to a financial loss, result in attacks against friends, or mean that your private data can be exposed. However, negative effects multiply on a corporate level considering the lives of employees, clients, and customers affected. A thorough cybersecurity onboarding and continuous training can help companies stay safe.

Recognize the challenge

Before we get into the best cybersecurity onboarding practices, let’s identify the real challenge. Don’t look at cybersecurity as a means of fending off hacker attacks. That’s too daunting. You don’t know who’s going to attack you or how they are planning to do it.

But consider that humans are responsible for 85% of all data breaches and now you know who to focus on. Everyone at the company. So your challenge is not to defend against hackers but to make sure your staff is prepared to face cyber threats.

That’s why even the basic onboarding process must include guidelines on how company employees should deal with such factors as guests, emails, or remote work. However, the best onboarding practices should not only include a set of rules but explain why they are necessary in the first place.

Best onboarding practices are long term

Every new employee must take in an astonishing amount of information when they join the company. That’s why it’s crucial to look at the entire onboarding process and organize it into steps. For example, while the health and safety procedures must be completed within the first two weeks, learning resources can wait.

What about cybersecurity? While you should introduce the most important guidelines on the first day, don’t forget that cybersecurity works best when it’s a habit. That’s why a major part of cybersecurity training should be continuous, contain real-life examples, and teach employees about both physical and digital security.

Physical threats

Physical threats are just as common and dangerous as their digital counterparts. Imagine coming to work one day and meeting a young woman outside of the building. Trying to hold back tears, she explains that she’s late to an important meeting.

For most people, letting this person in is an act of kindness. However, that woman could have easily been a hacker tasked to snoop around. That’s why, if you hold the door open for a stranger, you must make sure they meet the person they say they’re going to meet.

Physical threats also include those to personal security. For example, the habit of locking devices when you leave your desk or following security protocols when working away from the office.

Social engineering

Social engineering can work in the real world or the digital world. In fact, 12 different types of social engineering attacks have been identified. Here are a few common ones:

• Phishing

Phishing emails try to entice readers to click on a link or download an attachment. While email spam filters manage to catch most of these emails, knowing how to recognize them is imperative.

• Vishing

Vishing, or voice phishing, can be very dangerous since most people don’t associate phone calls with cyber threats. To increase the likelihood of success, attackers can create new identities and prepare elaborate backstories.

• Spoofing

To spoof is to create look-alike messages, emails, and websites. With spoofing, scammers usually try to steal the user’s credentials. Common spoofing targets include Amazon delivery messages, Netflix login pages, and bank and financial institution websites.

One of the best onboarding practices helping employees learn about social engineering is to add “fake” phishing emails into the onboarding process. This practice helps the company’s security team accurately evaluate employees’ level of preparedness and keep them ready to face real attacks.

Check out this post to learn more about preventing social engineering attacks.

Data protection

So far, we’ve talked only about the physical and digital threats. Proactive security measures can also be extremely effective. For instance, if people in the company know that email attachments are only sent securely, they are much less likely to fall for a phishing email.

The same applies to password management. New employees must absorb a lot of information and create many new accounts. To avoid feeling overwhelmed, they should be taught how encryption tools protect files and password managers help create secure notes and strong passwords.

Secure coding practices

Needless to say, software bugs are a major reason behind successful cyber attacks. That’s why you have to make sure your code is up to the highest security standards.

Ensuring high security standards can be achieved by organizing work so code is always checked by someone with cybersecurity experience. In addition to double-checking code, you can analyze code with various third-party tools, encourage continuous training, and establish clear guidelines for secure coding.

Staying alert

Needless to say, every person in the company should know how to report suspicious emails. But to make sure threats are actually reported, you must nurture a culture of shared responsibility. Along with strategies to avoid cybersecurity incidents, you should also have a response strategy so everyone knows what to do if something bad does happen.