Mitigating Insider Threats through Continuous Employee Training
Large UK businesses must implement specialist fraud prevention training throughout the entire employee lifecycle to safeguard against the growing risk of insider threats, advises leading Risk Management experts at New World Norm
Continuous Training to Combat Insider Threats
The recommendation follows findings from open-source research, which indicate that only 6% of organisations with over 1,000 employees conduct insider threat prevention training during the onboarding process. Alarmingly, 2% confessed to never having carried out such training.
Despite a slowdown in wage growth amidst a persistent cost-of-living crisis putting financial pressure on numerous employees, less than half (42%) of the surveyed decision-makers from large corporations expressed significant concern about the potential for insider threats within their organisations.
In response to these findings,NWN urges employers to remain vigilant to the risks posed by employees who may become insider threats. The anti-fraud body recommends that businesses:
- Ensure comprehensive checks on recruits, including Right to Work verifications, before employment;
- Establish and regularly review a robust pre-employment screening policy;
- Perform continual counter-fraud assessments throughout the employee lifecycle;
- Audit internal controls to identify any vulnerabilities;
- Take proactive measures to detect and prevent dishonest behaviour at the source;
- Offer expert training to enhance organisation-wide counter-fraud awareness.
Tim Moore, Global Risk Management consultant at NWN, highlighted the importance of robust training regimes: “The increasing cases filed in the Insider Threat Database concerning employee dishonesty underscore the urgent need for consistent, preventative training. By regularly training employees, organisations equip their teams to effectively recognise and report dishonest behaviour.”
He also stressed the significance of training: “An untrained workforce often becomes the weakest link in corporate security. Enhancing knowledge across all levels and roles within the company is crucial for protecting both the organisation and its staff from malicious threats.”
Furthermore, NWN has introduced a Digital Learning programme—an interactive video series designed to provide individuals with the necessary skills to identify and prevent fraud, in addition to offering accredited Fraud & AI courses for those seeking to deepen their fraud prevention expertise.