Goal: Learn how to identify, prevent, and respond to phishing attacks with simulated scenarios.
What is phishing and why is it dangerous?
Phishing is a type of cyberattack that uses deceptive emails, websites, or messages to trick unsuspecting users into revealing sensitive information, clicking on malicious links or downloading harmful attachments. Phishing can lead to identity theft, data breaches, ransomware infections, financial losses, and reputational damage.
Did you know that 91% of successful data breaches started with a spear-phishing attack? [1] Phishing can target anyone in an organisation, from employees to executives, and can exploit human emotions such as curiosity, fear, urgency, or greed.
Therefore, it is crucial to educate and train your staff on how to recognize and avoid phishing attempts, as well as how to report and respond to them if they occur. One of the best ways to do this is by conducting phishing simulations.
What are phishing simulations and how do they work?
Phishing simulations are controlled exercises that mimic real phishing attacks and test the awareness and behaviour of your employees. They are designed to emulate various scenarios, such as fake invoices, password reset requests, urgent notifications or prize offers. You can then measure how your staff reacts to them.
Phishing simulations can be conducted using specialized software or services that allow you to create, send and track simulated phishing emails or messages to your employees. You can customize the content, sender, subject, timing and frequency of the simulations, as well as the landing pages, attachments or links that they contain.
The goal of phishing simulations is not to trick or punish your employees, but to educate and empower them. By exposing them to realistic and relevant phishing scenarios, you can help them identify the signs of phishing. These include spelling errors, mismatched domains, suspicious attachments or requests for personal information. You can also teach them how to prevent phishing, such as by verifying the sender, checking the URL, using strong passwords or enabling multi-factor authentication. And you can instruct them how to respond to phishing, such as by deleting the email, reporting it to IT or security team, or contacting the legitimate sender.
What are the benefits of phishing simulations?
Phishing simulations can provide many benefits for your organisation, such as:
- Improving the security awareness and skills of your employees
- Reducing the risk of falling victim to real phishing attacks
- Enhancing the security culture and behaviour of your organisation
- Increasing the confidence and trust of your customers and partners
- Complying with the regulatory and industry standards
Phishing simulations can also help you evaluate the effectiveness of your security training and policies, as well as identify the areas that need improvement or reinforcement. You can use the data from the simulations to measure the click-through rates, report rates and response times. These metrics indicate the level of awareness and resilience of your employees. You can also use the results to tailor your training to the specific needs and challenges of your staff.
Start your phishing simulation journey today
We’ve partnered with KnowBe4 who offer a comprehensive solution for phishing simulations. This solution enables you to identify, record, and monitor your users’ interactions with the simulated attacks.
Best of all, they offer a free phishing simulation for up to 100 users. Here’s how it works:
- Click the link below and complete the form. (Your details are needed to receive the report and they get passed back to us, so we know you’ve completed a test and can discuss your results)
- Customise the phishing test template based on your environment
- Choose the landing page your users will see if they click a link
- Show users which red flags they missed or a 404 page
- Contact your mail provider (that may be us) to whitelist the KnowBe4 emails
- Send out your free phishing simulation
- You will receive a PDF emailed to you within 24 hours with your Phish-prone % score. You will also receive charts to share with your team
- See how your organisation compares to others in the industry
Click here to start your phishing journey
Phishing simulations are an important tool in defending against real attacks. They can help you raise the awareness and readiness of your employees, as well as improve the security posture and culture of your organisation. Conducting regular and realistic phishing simulations can protect your organisation from one of the most common and costly cyber threats.
