KnowBe4 Security Awareness Training

There are three things I like most about this service. First, I like the mix that they use for training. In addition to interactive, traditional online training, which includes scenarios, question and answer quizes, etc., they also have well dramatized scenarios that mix humor with life lessons in the work environment that are amazingly well crafted. This makes training fun and memorable. Secondly, they bring in real people to go over the many tricks that real hackers today use to gain access to our online information. Coming from an I.T. professional, this is nothing like what you see in the movies - which is quite refreshing and engaging. Lastly, the training gives great interactive tips on spotting key attributes of smishing, phishing, fake websites, etc., which can help both a novice as well as an advanced user, the ability to stop and examine, rather than simply go through the motions and ultimately become a victim.

It is usually reliable, does the job, and is very user friendly.

The biggest feature has been the breadth of content available and the fact that it is constantly updated. I have been able to find fresh content for our biggest risks and compliance requirements. Second, their original content The Inside Man provides an engaging way to increase user awareness. The third strength is customer support and service. We have quarterly check-in calls with the account manager to go over what has been working, what is new, and answer technical questions.

Some weaknesses that I would point out about KnowBe4 might seem minor but are sometimes distracting. First, as is a weakness of training in general, it can be wordy - especially when there is no audio in the training. For business professionals, this can be cumbersome because it requires your full attention which is, for many of us, hard to do when you're multi-tasking. Mixing the audio with the text is much better, since it allows someone to read as well as hear what is being read. Secondly, many times the training sessions try too hard to encompass several topics rather than drive home one or two topics. The saying too many eggs in one basket only works if you're a child on an Easter egg hunt rather than training. Lastly, sometimes the questions are asked at the end of the training rather than throughout the training. The regular person retains the first and last ten minutes of a conversation which, if you're training a topic that they are not very interested in, can become a bother because it might require them to take the quiz again due to failure.

I dislike that they release content only in English and translation is delayed. My organization's language requirements tend to hold us back from the latest and greatest content. I also find that a lot of the trainings are very long, too long for my users taste. We prefer content that is less than 5 minutes, which can be hard to find.

I only have a few minor suggestions to improve the product. The first would be the ability to manage micro-content as part of a larger campaign. If I want to include some emails, newsletters, games, and video modules I have to either schedule each piece as a separate campaign or release them all at once in one campaign. The second thing that could be improved would be the ability to customize content within a module. I can use our branding with some of the modules to make it less generic but the ability to add company specific content within a module would be a benefit. As an admin, I would like the ability to export a transcript of modules for accessibility purposes within other learning platforms. I can export scorm compliant files, but a transcript would also be good to provide to some learners.