Cyber security incidents targeted at UK schools are costly and increasing. According to the UK government, “Primary schools are relatively close to the typical business in terms of how many identify breaches or attacks - 52% identified a breach or attack in the past year. All other types of education institutions are more likely to have identified cyber security breaches or attacks in the last 12 months than the average UK business”. On average, education institutions lose 11.6 days of teaching and learning to cyber attacks. The prevalence of increased cyber attacks on education institutions highlights the importance of securing accounts on both a user and IT management level.
Google for Education is committed to building products that help protect student and teacher privacy while providing best-in-class security for education. Here are three ways education institutions can secure communication.
1) Protecting your domain & email security with Google for Education
Every day Gmail blocks 100 million phishing attempts. There have been zero actively exploited software vulnerabilities in Google Workspace for Education since November 2021. According to CISA, this is significantly less than other productivity vendors in this space. There are twice as many email-related security incidents for organisations using Microsoft 365 and Microsoft Exchange compared to Google Workspace for Education. In addition Google Workspace for Education users are 6.3x less likely than Microsoft users to have an email security insurance claim. As such, there is a 50% potential saving on cyber security insurance premiums by using Google Workspace for Education.
Domain authentication protocols, such as SPF, DKIM and, DMARC prevent your outgoing emails from being marked as spam by receiving servers. IT administrators can further secure Gmail with data loss prevention (DLP) rules and turning on compliance features such as optical character recognition scanning email attachments for image files. With Google Workspace for Education Education Standard and Education Plus editions, admins can configure content compliance and objectionable content rules for Gmail messages with automated actions such as quarantining messages that have shared sensitive data, such as credit card details, in an image. The ability to control sensitive data shared in Gmail is currently in beta. With DLP for Gmail, data protection
rules are scanned asynchronously, which means that the message is blocked or quarantined after it leaves the sender’s mailbox and before being dispatched to the recipient. The good news is that soon this feature will scan data protection rules synchronously with the Send button to notify users about sensitive content in a message before it leaves their mailbox.
2) Reliable User Authentication
Google keeps 74 million accounts secure daily with help from Google’s Password Manager, and every year 700 million people strengthen their security with the security checkup. Secure authentication methods prevent unauthorised users from accessing data. Multi-factor authentication is a powerful tool for protecting access to accounts. It supports a variety of sign-in methods including SMS, security keys and biometrics alongside a secure password.
The Advanced Protection Programme settings safeguard users with high visibility and sensitive information from targeted online attacks. Advanced Protection verifies identity with a physical security key. Safe Browsing on Chrome protects four billion devices against risky sites, and the Advanced Protection performs even more stringent checks before each download and only allows
verified downloads.
Google Workspace presents login challenges, an extra security question to verify identity, if it detects a suspicious sign-in attempt or that an unauthorised person is trying to access a user’s account. Context- Aware Access is available with Education Standard and Plus editions. Context-Aware Access provides granular control policies to apps based on attributes such as user identity, location, device security status, and IP address.
3) Enterprise-Grade Scalability & Security
Over three billion people use Google Workspace, including businesses, education, and consumers. Working on enterprise-grade scalability means that the Google for Education ecosystem can handle extreme shifts in activity and ensure 99.9% uptime. So let’s keep digital learning safer with a preventative approach to cybersecurity based on best-in-market cloud security and comprehensive policies.
By leveraging these robust security features and best practices, educational institutions can create a safer digital learning environment and focus on delivering quality education.
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