In the 21st century, with the rapid rise in cybercrime, ensuring security awareness among employees is paramount. This document describes the evolution of security awareness training methods, from traditional approaches to modern, AI-driven techniques. The focus is on imparting knowledge of current security threats and best security practices.

20th Century Approach: PowerPoint Presentations

PowerPoint presentations and training videos have long been the go-to tools for training. Some interactive training sessions also include quizzes at the end designed to improve knowledge retention.

While they offer a structured format for conveying information, the typical busy employee often postpones training, perceiving it as an interruption to their schedule. The expression “Death by PowerPoint,” coined by Angela R. Garber, is a real phenomenon. In the modern age, attention spans have shortened, especially for content deemed non-mission-critical. The term TLDR (Too Long; Didn't Read) has often been promoted, where people just want a summary of the key points and action items.

Issues with these antiquated training methods include a lack of engagement and apathy, further exacerbated by the length of the presentation or video. Two examples of short presentations are below:

Cyber Security Awareness Training presentation on Phishing (PDF) - Opens in new tab

Cyber Security Awareness Training presentation Map (PDF) - Opens in new tab

Consider the length and number of slides in the PDF or PPTX of the script. Do you really think the audience will remain energized and inspired at the end? It's pretty dry and similar to many other presentations they may have viewed before.

A Modern Approach: AI-generated Video

• Leveraging AI technology, InVideo allows for the creation of engaging and concise videos.

• AI capabilities can customize the content based on the audience’s level and the tone that the creator wishes to set.

• A brief bulletin video that addresses a timely topic:

  Security Awareness Videos (YouTube):

  Vigilance against Phishing

  Security Awareness for developers

  Security Awareness for junior developers

Tools and Resources Utilized in Content Creation

In this lab, several tools and resources were utilized in the following order:

1. Notion (https://www.notion.so/): Notion serves as our ‘second brain’ for collating and organizing resources for documentation in projects.
2. Summarization of Original News Report: Hackers Hijack GitHub Accounts. The summary includes key points and recommendations for the audience to follow.
3. InVideo (https://ai.invideo.io/): Use the text from step #1 to create a video, editing for length. By harnessing the power of AI, we can create video content that engages and educates our audience. InVideo will continue to be a key tool in our arsenal as we strive to innovate and elevate our training methodologies.
4. Pexels (https://www.pexels.com/): Pexels is a rich source of royalty-free stock images. I used it for an engaging link that could be used in an email to entice the reader to click on it.
5. Canva (https://www.canva.com/): Canva allows for the editing of images from Pexels, allowing me to add a play overlay button to my image from Pexels in step #4 above.

In summary, the goal of this project is to create timely, bite-sized training that develops and nurtures a culture of vigilance and resilience within the organization. Delivery media includes email (via Intranet hosting of video) and social media shorts.