Here’s what we’ll cover
It’s not about crimes it’s about criminals
Security awareness is not just another workplace routine it is one of the biggest global battles of our time. We’re not just fighting a handful of crimes like cyber attacks, fishing, and ransomware. We’re fighting an entire cyber fraud ecosystem of overlapping crimes and criminals that touch every part of our society.
From workplaces to schools and hospitals, into our homes, our democracies and our election systems. It’s easy to feel powerless and yet something as easy as a personal emotional motivation, a personal reason there is our hidden superpower.
Fighting back with habits
We’re not going to fix security awareness with constant security training. Behaviorists, and the years of hard earned experience, have told us that simply doesn’t work.
That while relentless and continuous training can change knowledge, skills, and attitudes, it rarely changes habits and behavior. That can only happen by understanding what motivates habit changing, and according to psychologists the best and perhaps only way to achieve that is to introduce a strong personal and emotional connection to the motivation.
Motivation #1, seniors and the elderly
Scams against older adults are not just surging, estimated by the Federal Trade Commission to be costing older adults more than $80 billion a year, but they’re also having a devastating impact.
Financial scams have just as much emotional and psychological impact as they do financial, destroying retirement plans, forcing victims away from essential social connections, and often shortening their lives.
These most vulnerable victims could be your parents or grandparents, And the people behind those crimes and scams are often the very same people behind the attacks on your workplace. Would that motivate you? Help fix one, help stop the other.
Motivation #2, teen sextortion
kids and teens are exceptionally vulnerable to all kinds of scams, not only because they can be naive and overly trusting but because of their overuse on social media.
Social media has been a breeding ground for a particularly devastating kind of scam known as sextortion, where scammers disguising themselves as other teenagers encouraged there young victims to share personal sexual images of themselves and then demands substantial ransoms in exchange for not sharing those images publicly.
The impact on these victims can also be devastating, with nearly forty reported teen suicides as a result of this one scam. A clear example of how online scams cost lives. These victims, these targets, could be your kids, grandkids, nieces and nephews. And again the same kinds of people behind the attacks on your workplace. Are you motivated yet? Your simple awareness and vigilance could help stop both.
Meet The Faces Behind The Faceless Crimes
It can’t be just about the crimes. We have to know the criminal minds behind them. Like the entrepreneur often referred to as the Prince. A highly respected and successful 37-year-old property investor who ran more than 100 businesses across 30 countries, managed to secure a commercial banking license at the age of 29, hung out with some of the most powerful politicians in Asia, was a citizen of half a dozen countries, and even owned one of Cambodia’s main airlines.
Until authorities seized nearly $15 billion in cryptocurrency traced back to a massive pig butchering operation he oversaw. His business model was based on forcing thousands of kidnapped workers operating from prison like compounds to make all those scam investment, romance, and tech support calls that have reached so much havoc on so many lives.
You’re not fighting phishing, you’re fighting people like the Prince.
AI, Deepfakes, and HI
AI is changing everything, for better and for worse. It’s also accelerating every type of cybercrime and scam making it much easier to set them up, make them more believable and maximize their profits.
And the deep fakes that they’re generating are making it almost impossible to trust anything that we see or hear. But our best defence is still HI. Human intelligence.
Your best defense against criminals and their AI assisted crimes and deep fakes is still your vigilance and awareness, your behavior and habits, your gut instincts and skepticism, and most of all, your motivation.
What Makes You More Likely To Be Victimized
What’s often overlooked in discussions about cybercrime, scams, fraud, is what seems to make some people more vulnerable than others – more likely to fall for a scam. And knowing this, understanding the psychology of crime, could increase your chances of not being the next victim.
Criminals are experts on human behavior and psychology, and especially the incredible value of exploiting cognitive biases. The more you understand about your own the better protected you’ll be. And your family too.
The Power Of Skepticism
the most powerful crime fighting technology of them all just happens to be wedged right between your ears. And one of the many superhero crime fighting powers out that chaos machine in your head is skepticism.
Not to be confused with cynicism or paranoia but encouraging in ourselves and our family members a healthy regime of skepticism – willing to believe but that needing to be persuaded by evidence – is one of the most powerful ways to teach ourselves to pause before falling for a scam.
And the superpower we can harness in every aspect of our lives beyond security.
The Key Habits to Change
AS A SINGLE VIDEO
The Big Security Talk is available in a variety of formats to match your needs and schedules, including a single 20 or 40 minute video complete with your organization’s branding.
AS A SERIES OF SHORT VIDEOS
The Big Security Talk can also be delivered as a collection of short videos, usually 2-3 minutes in length and hosted by you or hosted free of charge by us.
AS A LIVE WEBINAR
A 45-minute live webinar with time at the end for user questions, and available afterwards as a permanent recording.