Mimecast Research

Half of Workers Admit to Opening Emails They Considered Suspicious - Seite 2

“This research shows that while there is a lot of awareness training offered, most of training content and frequency is completely ineffective at winning the hearts and minds of employees to reduce today’s cyber security risks,” said Josh Douglas, vice president of threat intelligence. “Better training is crucial to avoid putting any organization at risk. Employees need to be engaged, and trainings need to be short, visual, relevant and include humour to make the message resonate. In fact, Mimecast has found that end-users who have taken Mimecast Awareness Training are 5.2 times less likely to click on dangerous links. Awareness training can’t be just another check-the-box activity if you want a security conscious organization.”

The Younger Generation Can Be an Organization’s Greatest Risk

Despite being the most tech savvy generation, younger workers may be putting organizations at greater risk. Surprisingly almost 60 percent of the 16-24 age group admitted to opening emails even though they looked suspicious. This group is also more guilty of blurring the lines between their business and personal usage of these devices. Seventy-nine percent of the 16-24 age group reported using their issued devices for personal use, while only 42% of the older - 55+ - group admitted the same.

“Security professionals need to ensure their organization isn’t growing more exposed as threats evolve to better target the unsuspecting,” commented Douglas. “With everyone’s home becoming their new office, classroom and place of residence, it’s not really a surprise that employees are using their company-issued devices for personal use. However, this is also a big opportunity for threat actors to target victims in new ways. We’ve seen attacks become more aggressive and the attack surface has expanded due to the new ‘WFH’ or hybrid work environments.”

Respondents averaged 1.9 hours of personal activity on their work devices a day, with almost a quarter (22%) clocking more than 3 hours of non-work-related screen time.

The research also revealed how habits differ between males and females. Seventy-eight percent of men reported using their corporate device for personal business versus 65% of women.

Methodology

Data was collected by Censuswide in September 2020 with more than 1,000 respondents from organizations in the United Kingdom, United States (US), Australia, South Africa, Netherlands, Germany, Canada and United Arab Emirates (UAE). Organizations included have greater than 100 employees and currently have a company-issued mobile device, laptop or computer for work.