With hacking attacks on the rise, is cybersecurity training still working?

As the internet becomes an increasingly vital part of our lives, more needs to be done to prevent vital services from being disrupted.

The threat of cyberattacks is growing and much more needs to be done to educate businesses and users about risks in order to prevent widespread damage and disruption as a result of cyber incidents. Events like ransomware attacks against utilities and infrastructure providers, production facilities and hospitals have demonstrated that cyberattacks can have very real consequences for people, restricting access to vital goods and services for days, weeks and even months. But despite the risk posed by cyberattacks, many businesses and their boardrooms still don't fully understand the threats they're facing from cybercriminals and how to best defend their networks against them.

Part of the problem is that, for many businesses, cybersecurity isn't ingrained into everyday operations and employees are only asked to think about it when doing annual cybersecurity training -- leaving companies at risk from cyberattacks the rest of the year.

"I think one of the most important things to realise is most of the education and training done, it's not very effective," Stuart E. Madnick, professor of information technology and engineering systems at MIT Sloan Executive Education told ZDNet Security Update. "The 30-minute video you're obligated to watch once a year doesn't do the job".

According to Madnick -- who has been at M.I.T. since 1972 and has served as the head of MIT's Information Technologies Group for more than 20 years -- organisations need to build a culture of cybersecurity that actively involves everyone. If people have a greater understanding of how their organisation falling victim to a cyberattack could affect them, it could lead to everyone being more careful when it comes to cybersecurity.

See full article here: https://www.zdnet.com/article/your-cybersecurity-training-needs-improvement-because-hacking-attacks-are-only-getting-worse/

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