It’s been said if you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day, but if teach him to fish, you feed him for a lifetime.
In a kind of a corollary to that, Bob Black, the founder of RK Black, is said to have told our copier technicians that fixing copiers was only doing half of the job. The other half of the job is to teach our clients on the proper use of their copiers — thereby helping clients to possibly avoid or reduce downtimes in the future.
In both of these scenarios, whether it is fishing or using a copier, the education of the user is critical to maintaining life, be that for a person or for a copier.
Fishing, Fixing and Network Security
The same is true in network security. You can implement all kinds of network security measures — firewalls, VPNs, antivirus software, email filters and so on — for your organization’s network, but if you don’t teach your users how to recognize and avoid cybersecurity threats, you’re only doing half the job. You’re only throwing your users a fish.
Many organizations daily receive hundreds of emails bearing viruses and other forms of malware, many sent directly to user inboxes and others sent to group email addresses. But no matter how small or large your organization, whether you have two users or 200, all it takes is one click on a malicious link or one opening of a virus-laden attachment, and your network is compromised.
With one push of the index finger on the mouse, your user has effectively ushered the enemy into your network bypassing all of your network security measures. For many businesses, such an intrusion could mean thousands of dollars in loss due to downtime and maybe even fines.
Teach your users to fish and not be caught
That is why it’s so important, for the sake of your organization’s network security, to teach your users how to recognize potentially dangerous links and attachments, as well as other social engineering schemes — also known as phishing — and to avoid them. This way, they can join your organization’s network defense efforts and not unknowingly compromise them.
If you don’t know where to start on educating your users, read this and share: How to spot a phishing email.
But as another option, as part of our managed network services, we offer our clients a user-friendly training tool that can drastically help to improve your network security by training your users how to recognize and avoid social engineering schemes.
The tool not only comes with engaging, short, easy-to-understand videos followed by online quizzes, it also provides you with the ability to launch fake schedulable phishing campaigns to test your users and reporting to help you determine which users may need more training.
Conclusion
Educating your users is necessary for a secure network, but it doesn’t have to be difficult. If you’re interested in using this tool for your organization, give us a call. We’ll help you teach your users to fish.
About R.K. Black, Inc.
R.K. Black, Inc. is an Oklahoma City-based, family-owned leading provider of office technology solutions to small and medium-sized businesses in Oklahoma and Kansas. We specialize in everything business technology from copier, fax, printer and scanner technology to document management, onsite paper shredding services, VoIP phone systems and managed IT support to video surveillance solutions.
If you want to learn more about us, feel free to explore the website, read our other blogs or click the button below to be contacted by one of our reps and tell you! Also, be sure to keep watching our social media channels on Facebook and Twitter for more business tips from our blog.
