Security awareness training 101: Get your startup ready

Fantastic news! You’re close to landing your biggest client yet—and it’s the kind of opportunity that will propel your growing business forward.

There’s only one thing standing between you and a signed contract: your prospective customer can only work with a company with a SOC 2. You assure them that you’re on track to becoming compliant and immediately look up “What is SOC 2 compliance?” Minutes later, you’re browsing vendors to determine which one can get your company ready the fastest (hint: Vanta can get you ready in weeks instead of months).

At the same time, you’re trying to identify a security awareness training for your employees to satisfy the requirement to “communicate information to improve security knowledge and awareness.”

What if we told you that security awareness training was more than just a hurdle to overcome on the road to SOC 2 compliance? After all, viewing security awareness and education as a critical investment in your people has the potential to empower and engage your employees and make your business more resilient long-term.

Security isn’t just a compliance issue, it’s a culture issue. In this guide, we’ll explore why security awareness training is essential to any growing business and how you can approach building your own program.

‍

What you’ll learn:

• What security awareness training is
• Why security awareness is critical for your company 
• Why it’s important to establish a strong security culture early on
• What to look for in a security awareness training

What is security awareness training?

Security awareness training helps your employees develop good security habits and make more informed security decisions. By teaching them to recognize and report security threats and helping them understand their role in keeping your company’s data secure, your employees are empowered to practice strong security behaviors that reduce your company’s risk and ultimately improve your overall security posture.

While providing your employees with regular security awareness training is a basic requirement of security and privacy frameworks such as SOC 2 and HIPAA, it’s also a best practice to help your employees keep security top of mind.

‍

{{cta_withimage6="/cta-modules"}}

Why do you need security awareness training?

Did you know that even small and midsize startups need security awareness training? Regardless of your company’s size or industry, here’s why security education training is critical:

Your employees are your strongest asset

According to the Verizon 2023 Data Breach Investigations Report, 74% of all breaches involve people—whether through error, privilege misuse, the use of stolen credentials, or social engineering. This means that your employees are your strongest asset in protecting against potential breaches, and it’s your role to help support them and help them understand how to keep your company safe. After all, it’s much easier for your employees to take proactive measures when they understand what to look for. Keep in mind that when you’re moving quickly, it’s especially easy for threat actors to use simple techniques such as phishing to try and socially engineer your employees.

‍

‍

Ensure compliance with industry frameworks, standards, and regulations

Providing security awareness training helps your company meet relevant industry frameworks, standards, and regulations—such as SOC 2, ISO 27001, GDPR, HIPAA, and more. Not only can fines for non-compliance be substantial, but helping your employees understand their responsibilities within these specific frameworks and standards can reduce the risk of any potential violations.

‍

‍

Build and foster a positive security culture

Within a positive security culture, your employees feel comfortable raising security questions, concerns, and discussions. Providing your employees with a fun, empowering, and encouraging security awareness training can help establish and scale such a culture as your company grows.

‍

Why it’s important to establish a culture of security

In a nutshell, creating a culture of security from the start is the most effective way to protect against a data breach. Remember that your employees are your strongest asset and solution. It’s critical to make them aware of common threats and how to avoid them, treat them as an asset instead of a liability, and actively involve them in keeping your networks and physical spaces secure.

Generally speaking, it’s best to establish these practices and values up front in your organization. This is because it’s much easier to establish the right guardrails and security hygiene from the start than it is to try to change deeply-ingrained habits down the road. 

Second, it’s far easier (not to mention less expensive) to preemptively invest in educating your employees about security best practices than it is to try to recover once a breach has already occurred.

‍

‍

What to look for in security awareness training

Here are a few tips for what to look for when assessing the best path for your security training:

‍

Security issues your employees face in and out of the office

Here’s an example of common security issues that should ideally be covered by your security awareness training program—including any you choose:

Protecting your accounts

• Passwords and password managers
• Multi-factor authentication (MFA)

‍

Common attacks

• Malware
• Ransomware
• Credential stuffing
• Social engineering
• Phishing

‍

Protecting your devices

‍

Protecting sensitive information

• Secure data handling
• Policy violations

‍

Office security and remote work 

• Whiteboard hygiene
• Clean desk best practices
• Remote work best practices
• Secure document handling and disposal

‍

Reporting suspicious activity

‍

How to respond when there’s been a breach

Security awareness programs should also prepare your employees to respond productively and quickly if they suspect that company devices or information may be compromised. While the process for reporting may differ between companies, it’s important for your employees to understand that timing matters.

‍

Empowering content that makes learning fun

There are many security training programs that may meet your minimum requirements, and it’s important to pick a program that’s aligned with your company’s principles and approach to learning about security. For instance, while it’s important to learn about security, there’s no need for training to be painful, scary, or pedantic, or to use fear-based techniques to motivate employees into good security practices.

Instead, look for security awareness training that aligns with your company’s culture—and empowers your employees to make informed security decisions at work and at home rather than just check a box. Remember that the length of training doesn’t necessarily correlate with quality; it’s more important for your employees to retain critical information and know how to identify and report potential security incidents.

‍

Security awareness training that empowers startups

Vanta offers a security and privacy training library, including modules for Security Awareness, HIPAA, GDPR, CCPA, and PCI DSS—all developed by our in-house team of security, privacy, and compliance experts to help ensure your employees learn about important and required principles for each framework. Our training modules are designed to provide engaging, memorable, and relevant content for your employees. 

In addition, Vanta keeps a record of employee completions for proof during your audit. Proof of security training remains even after off-boarding, for a full record of security training compliance.

Whether you’re a current Vanta customer or you’re just starting to think about SOC 2 compliance, Vanta can help your team develop the security knowledge and skills necessary to protect your company’s most important assets.

‍

To check out our security and privacy training modules, log in to your Vanta account or learn more here. If you’re not yet a Vanta customer, request a demo today.

‍

{{cta_simple3="/cta-modules"}}