Jan Populaire

SME’s and Cyber Security Awareness: when will the horse drink?

What can you do to decrease the cyber risk in your SME? Make people aware they can be the next victim, discuss the risks & threats, stick to them with demo’s, selftests, games, storytelling, incentives, trainings, a lot of carrots and o yeah, sometimes a stick. But all that might not be enough to change insecure behaviour into a safe attitude.

Most Belgian SME’s are not working on the cyber security awaress of their staff despite lots of governmental (the Belgian regions, the federal government, Europe,…) encouragements, ranging from subsidized programmes to important financial incentives to increase cyber resilience.

Jan Populaire has a Master’s degree in Germanic Philology KULeuven and is a marketing & communication specialist. The past seven years Jan has been working in the BNP Paribas Fortis Centre of Expertise Security. He organized security awareness actions & training for staff and customers. He is an engaged member of the Cyber Security Coalition Focus Group Awareness (co-chair till end 2023) and strongly believes that cooperation between enterprises, academic world and governmental organisations is key to counter cybercrime effectively.

Jan will guide you through the wood and illustrate his story with practical examples that have proven to work.