Raising Cyber Security Awareness in UK’s Critical National Infrastructure (CNI)

The Challenge

The Centre for the Protection of National Infrastructure (CPNI) had identified a need to increase the awareness of cyber security issues within the CNI community specifically for those involved with securing Industrial Control Systems (ICS). To successfully address this, CPNI wanted to develop the security skills and competencies of ICS Executives, Managers and Practitioners through the provision of training courses.

The Solution

The resulting training project was to be delivered as part of the UK’s national cyber security strategy and include a program for training the trainers from the staff in CPNI.

Beginning with an assessment of the key requirements and current skill levels (using members from UK CNI industries) the project team designed and delivered two separate courses, one being a half day awareness session for Executives and Managers and a second more in-depth two day course for Users and Practitioners. Both courses had associated handbooks provided to allow a degree of Performance Support after learning for all attendees as well as utilisation of the CISP portal to create a community of attendees who had undergone training. The program was refreshed and updated to incorporate changing requirements and any changes in the operating environment.

The Outcome

Since the launch of the solutions, nearly 50 different companies from all major CNI ICS industries/sectors have sent attendees to both courses. A Train the Trainer programme for both courses has also been run. This has led to a significant rise in the level of Cyber Security knowledge of the attendees as well as an improvement in their ability to effectively respond to a Cyber Security incident.