07 Mar South Africa’s AVeS Cyber Security to support SMEs and businesses with Kaspersky cybersecurity solutions

South Africa’s AVeS Cyber Security has become the first certified trainer in Africa for Kaspersky Interactive Protection Simulation (KIPS).

This added security technology in AVeS’ portfolio will allow the company to support SMEs and enterprises with game-changing cyber security awareness skills to help them make more informed cyber security decisions for their businesses.

The Kaspersky Interactive Protection Simulation (KIPS) is a gamified tool to help build strong cyber-safety skills within a company. Starting with the leadership teams, it incorporates a team-based, industry-specific board game with multilingual online tools to increase awareness of and improve decision-making in the risks and security problems of running modern computerised systems. The end result means a more risk aware and educated team who can defend a company or business against potential cyber threats and attacks.

AVeS Cyber Security has two certified trainers who are able to provide efficient cyber security awareness training throughout Africa.

Isabel Adams, People Enablement Director at AVeS Cyber Security, said:”We often see that senior team members don’t easily buy into security awareness programmes because the overall impression is that it is the responsibility of IT departments to secure the overall cyber security of the business. Senior management is often time-constrained, and they often don’t prioritise training programmes. The advantage of KIPS is that it is a single two- to four-hour interactive workshop session.

“KIPS is a strategic business simulation aimed at business decision-makers, system experts, IT staff and line managers that demonstrates the connection between business efficiency and cyber security.

“Game players can now get a real feel of cyber threats and solutions. Top- and mid-level decision-makers are placed as members of IT security teams into a simulated business environment, where they face a series of unexpected cyber threats. Their main goal in a KIPS game, as in the real business world, is to keep the company working and get revenue.”

She added: “The goal of the game is to illustrate how cyber attacks hurt revenues and how to build a cyber defence strategy by making choices from among the best proactive and reactive controls available.

“Every decision that teams make to the unfolding events changes the way the scenario plays out, and ultimately how much profit the company makes or fails to make. Balancing engineering, business and security priorities against the cost of a realistic cyber attack, the teams analyse data and make strategic decisions based on uncertain information and limited resources.”

Charl Ueckermann, Group CEO of AVeS Cyber International, said the feedback on the KIPS training is, overall, very positive.

He explained:”The outcome of every KIPS session we’ve had so far was that overall, cyber security awareness in the company improved. Senior management plays a crucial part in the cyber security of the business and, for example, when a sales team sees how the sales department can’t operate after an attack, they are much more aware of preventing such an attack.

“KIPS influences employee behaviour to detect weaknesses in their own cyber security. Organisations of all sizes now have access to the most advanced and comprehensive threat defence and remediation capabilities in an efficient, fast and cost-effective way.”