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Digital technology is essential for modern businesses. Without tools like cloud software, artificial intelligence, and smartphones, you simply cannot remain competitive. That’s common knowledge for any experienced manager or executive.
We live in a world defined by hyperconnectivity and distributed work. A world where everything is connected to the Internet, from computers and laptops to kitchen appliances. On the one hand, this shift has been immensely beneficial to businesses, opening up new revenue streams and hiring opportunities.
On the other hand, it’s also been incredibly advantageous for threat actors. Cybercriminals now have more ways than ever to break into a business’s network. They’re taking full advantage of that.
According to research from Crowdstrike, there was a 75% increase in cloud intrusions in 2024. Adversaries have also increasingly started to target commercial software providers to gain access to clients. Generative AI, meanwhile, is increasingly being employed to produce incredibly convincing social engineering campaigns.
According to Cybersecurity ventures, cybercrime cost businesses an estimated US$9.5 trillion this year, while IBM reports the average cost of a data breach at US$4.88 million. What’s more, one in three breaches now involve data not properly stored or tracked by IT, known as shadow data. This speaks to one of the most enduring problems in security, and the weakest link in any business’s security posture: Humans.
The need for cybersecurity training is clear. Unfortunately, organizing and delivering the training in a way that’s effective isn’t exactly easy if you rely solely on a traditional classroom setting. So don’t.
There’s a better way. Virtual cybersecurity labs can help you improve both the efficiency of your cybersecurity and your response time. Through hands-on experience, your employees can learn more about the threat your business faces. More importantly, your security team can learn how to mitigate those threats through cybersecurity product training.
The Importance of Cybersecurity
Most adversaries aren’t interested in spending countless hours probing for holes in firewalls or blind spots in threat intelligence. They want to go after low-hanging fruit that will give them access to larger organizations. That’s why so many of them set their sights squarely on businesses with weak security policies.
That’s not much of a surprise if you look at it from their perspective. Would you rather spend several weeks trying and failing to exploit a vulnerability in a business’s network, or gain immediate access by sending a phishing email to George in HR? The answer to that question should be pretty obvious.
Why Consider Cybersecurity Training?
Cybersecurity is no longer the sole domain of your IT department or your security team. It’s now everyone’s responsibility. That means providing security training to every employee, partner, and, in some cases, customer.
With your security team, you can mostly focus on live-fire exercises and product training. But for the rest of your employees, remember that they’re the weakest link in your defenses. You need to prioritize security awareness training that covers the following ground:
- Basic email safety, such as why you shouldn’t immediately download an attachment.
- Safe browsing practices, including how to recognize and avoid malvertising.
- How to recognize social engineering attacks such as phishing emails.
- Password hygiene, including how and why they should use a password manager.
- How to communicate the risk and scope of potential issues to your security team.
- Ensuring business data remains secure when working from home.
- Ensuring business data remains secure while traveling.
- The security risks of Gen AI.
Always remember that where security’s concerned, your business is fighting an uneven battle. You need to successfully fend off every cyberattack and intrusion attempt. Threat actors, on the other hand?
They only need to succeed once. It only takes a single mistake for a criminal to compromise your network and potentially tank your reputation. That’s why you need to get everyone on board with your security training — it’s the only way to stay safe.
Providing a Hands-On Experience In Your Security Training
Practical, working knowledge of cybersecurity requires persistence. You can’t simply train people once a year and call it a day. And you need to offer more than a PowerPoint presentation, a dense training manual, or a few videos on security risks.
The key to an effective employee training program is interactivity and engagement. The most secure businesses understand this. They know that virtual cybersecurity labs are arguably the best way to arm employees with the necessary knowledge of threats and threat actors.
What Are The Advantages of Hands-On Training for Cybersecurity?
Because virtual labs use simulations of real-world scenarios, they’re more practical, more compelling, and ultimately more effective. This kind of hands-on lab-based training is the future of employee education. Traditional methods like on-site classrooms and training videos simply cannot compete.
The benefits of delivering training through online cybersecurity labs include:
Lower Overhead
Because virtual labs run online, there’s no need to organize physical classrooms, coordinate schedules of instructors and employees, pay for travel, and install local hardware and software. This makes them a more economical alternative to in-person training.
Tangible, Hands-On Experience
There’s no better way to learn about a particular type of cyberattack than through first-hand experience. Your employees can learn how to interact with the threat, develop processes to eliminate it, and identify weaknesses in your current defenses.
Greater Scope
By delivering training experiences through a solution like a cyber range, you gain the ability to run repeated tests of attacks which, if they targeted your real-world infrastructure, would cripple your business. This is because virtual training happens entirely within a sandboxed environment. There’s no way for ransomware to leap from its container into your network.
Simple Maintenance
Most cyber range solutions are always up-to-date. Your cybersecurity training service provider handles all the heavy lifting. All your employees need to do is show up, and they can be kept up to speed with even the most modern of threats.
Adding more employees to an online class is also far easier than expanding a physical classroom. Virtual IT labs are therefore ideal for businesses looking to expand in the future.
Instant Feedback
While instructors have direct contact with participants through online message boards, voice chat, and video conferencing, most cyber range solutions deliver immediate feedback during simulations, as well. This gives your employees the ability to know immediately if they’ve done something wrong, as well as how to correct it. This feedback benefits them as much as it does your company.
Moreover, the skills, certifications, and experience your employees gain during cybersecurity training will help them in their future careers.
Are You Interested in Implementing Virtual Cybersecurity Labs?
In today’s landscape, no business can afford to ignore cybersecurity, no matter how large or small. That’s exactly what threat actors want. Cybersecurity training needs to be every bit as routine as software lifecycle management and financial reporting.
And everyone needs to be involved.
At any rate, we’re going to assume you understand the importance of cybersecurity to your company. You also know that virtual labs are a key component to any successful cybersecurity strategy. But do you know what’s involved in deploying and operating one of your own?
We can help with that. Check out How to Run Successful Cyber Range Simulations. After that, we’d also recommend having a look at Ten Cybersecurity Awareness Topics Your Training Should Cover in 2024.
This blog was published in September 2019 and updated in November 2024.
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