Our current analysis reveals a regarding discrepancy between workers’ confidence of their potential to establish social engineering makes an attempt and their precise vulnerability to those assaults.
Whereas 86% of respondents consider they’ll confidently establish phishing emails, practically half have fallen for scams prior to now. This disconnect between perceived competence and demonstrated vulnerability, the “confidence hole”, poses a considerable danger to organizations.
The Hazard of Overconfidence
The survey analysis, titled “Safety Approaches Across the Globe: The Confidence Hole,” surveyed 12,037 professionals throughout the UK, USA, Germany, France, Netherlands, and South Africa. It discovered that South Africa leads in each excessive confidence and excessive rip-off victimization charges.
That is consistent with our current Africa Cybersecurity Consciousness 2025 survey which revealed that whereas 83% of African respondents are assured of their potential to acknowledge cyber threats, greater than half (53%) don’t perceive what ransomware is, and 35% have misplaced cash to scams. These figures recommend that the Dunning-Kruger impact, which is a cognitive bias the place individuals overestimate their potential, is alive and effectively in cybersecurity. Overconfidence can create a false sense of safety, making workers extra prone to superior cyber threats.
Key Findings
- 86% of workers consider they’ll confidently establish phishing emails
- 24% have fallen for phishing assaults
- 12% have been tricked by deepfake scams
- 68% of South African respondents reported falling for scams—the best victimization charge
Past Coaching: Fostering a Safety Tradition
The report highlights the significance of fostering a clear safety tradition. Whereas 56% of workers really feel “very comfy” reporting safety considerations, 1 in 10 nonetheless hesitate as a consequence of concern or uncertainty. Curiously South Africans felt most comfy: 97% of South African respondents expressed some stage of consolation in reporting their considerations, displaying a stage of belief of their safety organisations.
Overconfidence fosters a harmful blind spot—workers assume they’re scam-savvy when, in actuality, cybercriminals can exploit greater than 30 susceptibility components, together with psychological and cognitive biases, situational consciousness gaps, behavioral tendencies, and even demographic traits.
To fight the overconfidence entice in cybersecurity consciousness, organizations ought to leverage the “prevalence impact” by sustaining a gentle and significant publicity to phishing simulations. The prevalence impact relies on analysis which signifies that when phishing makes an attempt are uncommon, customers change into much less adept at recognizing them, resulting in decreased detection potential. By recurrently exposing customers to simulated phishing assaults, organizations can improve detection expertise, reinforce vigilance, and mitigate the dangers related to overconfidence of their potential to identify threats.
To fight this, organizations want:
- Fingers-on, scenario-based coaching: To counteract misplaced confidence
- Steady schooling: To maintain up with evolving cyber threats
- Prevalence impact: expose customers to phishing simulation checks as ceaselessly as potential
- Foster an adaptive safety mindset: To reply successfully to new threats
The Backside Line
The survey findings emphasize the vital want for efficient human danger administration. Personalised, related, and adaptive coaching that caters to workers’ particular person wants needs to be carried out whereas additionally contemplating regional influences and evolving cyber ways. Within the battle in opposition to digital deception, probably the most harmful mistake workers could make is assuming they’re immune.
“Safety Approaches Across the Globe: The Confidence Hole,” is accessible for obtain right here.