In the fight against cyber crime, education and early awareness is the key to the prevention of an attack or security breach. As concern grows about the amount of information being stored by organisations and how secure it is, the Tech Partnership have worked with employers across the UK to help develop Information Security standards.
The new set of National Occupational standards for Information Security were published this week by the Tech Partnership, defining in detail the capabilities required for trainees and professionals to work in this vital field. This will help businesses understand what they need to be looking for when recruiting and what courses are needed to upskill their current staff. The Information Security skills shortage is among the most serious facing the tech sector. Recent Tech Partnership research showed that 95% of organisations identified gaps in their workforce’s cyber and information security skills, and with security breaches very much in the news, the situation remains serious.
The standards will be used by the Tech Partnership in the development of under-graduate programmes, such as degree apprenticeships, and for the new cyber security applied degree. They are also used for the development of programmes by and for employers.
Tony Venus, Head of Standards at the Tech Partnership said: “These standards can help employers build highly qualified and globally competitive Information security skills base. This is the best defence against the risks that many small and large businesses face every day.”
Information Security should not be seen as a single technology. Business should consider a strategy comprised of the processes, tools and policies necessary to prevent, detect, document and counter threats to digital and non-digital information. Processes and policies typically involve both physical and digital security measures to protect data from unauthorized access, use, replication or destruction. Information Security management can include everything from mantraps to encryption key management and malware detection.