Security awareness | Young staff scared they will cause a cyber-attack - education should be mandatory

According to research from EY, younger employees are some of the most likely to cause a cyber-attack at their organisation, especially with new AI-powered attacks being harnessed by cyber criminals.

Seen as the ‘weak link’ within an organisation, young people, despite being well-versed in technology, are more nervous about being targeted in a cyber-attack due to fears around feeling less equipped to navigate these types of threats.

These attitudes coming to light point to the larger, more pressing issue of a fundamental lack of awareness and education around cyber-attacks and how employees can keep themselves safe from being a victim.

There’s no two ways about it, employers need to do much more to keep themselves and their workforce safe. You might think cyber-crimes are only the concern of CTOs and IT specialists in the firm. But this should also be higher on the agenda of people managers, as one of the biggest cyber security risks for a company is their staff, with human error resulting in about 20% of all attacks.