Remember when cybersecurity was simple? All you needed was a firewall, some security controls, and antimalware tools, and you were fine. Unfortunately, those days are long gone.
Modern threat actors are savvier and more sophisticated than ever. They’re increasingly leveraging emerging technology like generative AI in their criminal activities. Consequently, in 2023, phishing attacks increased by over 1,265%.
In just the first half of 2024, ransomware gangs took home a record-breaking $459.8 million.
Those numbers would be grim enough on their own were it not for the fact that business networks have never been more expansive or complex. Organizations must now defend massive, constantly-expanding attack surfaces against an endless stream of bad actors. And while they need to successfully fend off every attack, the criminals just need to get through once.
Suffice it to say, it’s a grim time for cybersecurity. Some experts predicted back in 2022 that we’d finally get a handle on things. Unfortunately, that hasn’t happened — for adversaries, it’s mostly been business as usual.
Believe it or not, that’s actually good news. The reality is that no matter how much the world changes, there’s one thing that will always remain constant. However many new technologies or techniques emerge, it’ll be human error and simple carelessness that cause the majority of cyber incidents.
People are careless, and most threat actors are counting on that to offer their way in. With the right training, you can functionally slam the door in their faces. As for how you can implement that training, cybersecurity training labs are the answer — here are eight reasons your organization should already be using them.
There was a time when data governance and asset management were the sole domain of the IT department. Today’s landscape is defined by decentralization, from the cloud to the Internet of Things to distributed work. In this environment, a walled fortress approach to cyber security — where a small group of professionals are the sole arbiters of systems and data — is infeasible at best.
Security is now everyone’s responsibility, which means your security team must brainstorm a way to communicate the core concepts and principles to the entire organization. Cyber security simulation training offers a compelling means to achieve this. Rather than having to struggle through frustrating jargon and nebulous descriptions, employees can experience things firsthand.
Security awareness training has gained a (not entirely undeserved) reputation as boring and ineffective. The problem lies in the approach. Too often, security training professionals fall into one of the following traps:
How does hands on cyber security training address the points above, though?
“In the real world, some things can’t be learned by watching another individual do a task or have it explained,” reads a piece published in Forbes Magazine. “It actually takes performing the task in a safe, protected environment to learn how to do it right.”
There are certain subjects best learned through passive study. Some learners prefer hands-off training. However, as a whole, hands-on training is considerably more effective.
This is especially true with cyber security training. An understanding of the basic concepts is not enough for a training program to be effective. Trainees must also be encouraged to develop practical skills, which cannot effectively be learned through non-interactive materials.
Cyber security practice labs, on the other hand, provide trainees with an environment in which they can acquire, practice, and reinforce the core competencies necessary to keep corporate assets — and their own data — safe.
“To be blunt, many employees don’t care about your company’s cybersecurity. To them, that’s IT’s job — theirs is to focus on what you hired them to do. They’re not interested in learning about or upholding your security because they’re not invested in it.” — Living Security Blog.
We’ve already touched on the fact that most security training programs fail due to a lack of engagement. Security simulations are crucial to addressing this, and not just because hands-on training promotes more effective learning. They can also help you to gamify your security training, up to and introducing a bit of friendly competition to your trainees.
You might be surprised at just how effective a simple leaderboard can be at motivating trainees to care more about your business’s security posture. And that motivation is one of the foundational elements of promoting a culture of cyber security within your business.
The benefits of hands-on cybersecurity training extend far beyond educating the general workforce. Simulated environments allow businesses to practice, test, and refine their incident response plan for a range of different scenarios. The more realistic your virtual simulations, the better-equipped everyone within your organization will be if and when they encounter the real deal.
More importantly, such simulations can also help your business identify problems in its incident response plan prior to an incident.
For security teams themselves, hands-on training can also be invaluable. It can help security teams effectively make the shift from security to resilience. It can also equip your business with certification courses for professionals that want to improve their knowledge and skills.
Finally, because the training can be automated, it allows even lean security teams to promote widespread organizational awareness.
Hands-on cyber security training platforms equip your instructors with a valuable set of metrics for tracking learners as they proceed through each phase of their training, which is beneficial for several reasons:
This goes both ways, as well. Just as instructors can glean a great deal from metrics and course tracking, simulated training environments can provide learners with immediate,actionable feedback on what they’re doing wrong and how they might improve. This, in turn, allows them to learn from their mistakes and improve their overall approach.
Training isn’t the only value a virtual lab offers your organization. Just as these labs can be used to give trainees an environment in which to practice their skills, they also equip your security team with a simulated version of your ecosystem. In other words, your security professionals have a virtual testing environment in which they can run whatever simulations they deem necessary — without putting your business’s infrastructure or assets at risk.
There’s a wide range of use cases to which this can be applied:
Better yet, because these virtual labs do not rely on specific physical infrastructure, they can also be spun up without putting too much of a strain on your business’s resources.
Hollywood — and to some extent, the field of journalism — loves the idea of super-hackers: hyperintelligent criminals who break down sophisticated security just because they can. The reality is that if such individuals do exist, they make up a negligible segment of the digital underworld.
The reality is that nearly every threat actor, from the most sophisticated black hats to the garden variety fraudster, will look for the path of least resistance. You can hardly blame them for that. Why spend a month attempting to crack a corporation’s six-figure security when Jim from accounting will simply let you in through the back door?
In other words, adversaries rely on ignorance and carelessness. That means that the better-educated your employees become, the better your chances of avoiding a cyber incident.
People will still make mistakes. That’s inevitable. But you’ll be far less likely to experience a catastrophic breach because someone opened an email they should have deleted. And that will make your business a far less attractive target.
With virtual training software, your organization can accurately replicate its entire IT setup, providing step-by-step guidance and hands-on experience to contextualize the lessons taught by your training.
It also allows employees to gain hands-on experience with your systems and tools. Finally, software simulations allow your business to practice its response to and prepare for real-world cyberattacks.
The benefits of this approach include:
Modern businesses face an unprecedented threat landscape. Cyber criminals are more numerous, more sophisticated, and more persistent. In order to keep pace, businesses need to change how they approach security awareness training.
Passive learning is no longer sufficient. Instead, instructors need to promote engagement, understanding, and the development of practical skills through a hands-on approach. Cyber security training labs are the foundation of that approach, providing not just more engaging learning, but also deeper insights.
In short, simulation is the future of security training — and it’s time for you to embrace it.
*This Blog was updated in February 2025