KnowBe4 Security Awareness Training

Score9 out of 10

1,163 Reviews and Ratings

What is KnowBe4 Security Awareness Training?

KnowBe4 is a security awareness and compliance training and simulated social engineering product. It is used by organizations worldwide to strengthen their security culture and reduce risk.

The product includes a comprehensive suite of awareness and compliance training, real-time user coaching, AI-powered simulated social engineering, crowdsourced anti-phishing defense and an AI suite that enhances risk management through personalized training and automation. With content in 35+ languages, KnowBe4 provides an always-fresh library of engaging content to strengthen an organization's security culture.

KnowBe4 provides:

Baseline testing to assess the Phish-Prone™ Percentage of users through a free simulated phishing attack
Fully automated simulated phishing attacks, using thousands of customizable templates with unlimited usage
AI-Driven phishing and training recommendations based on users' phishing and training history
Enterprise strength reporting, showings stats and graphs for both training and phishing, ready for management
Artificial Intelligence Defense Agents (AIDA), AI-powered agents that reduce admin burden by automating template generation, training and reporting

Categories & Use Cases

Security Awareness Training

Media

Screenshot of The Phishing Dashboard. This displays how end users are doing at-a-glance and in comparison to peers across industries with Industry Benchmarking.

Screenshot of KnowBe4's partners, including The Security Awareness Company, Popcorn Training, exploqii, Twist & Shout, El Pescador, CLTRe, Saya University, and MediaPRO. Together, they create security awareness training content available in the ModStore.

Screenshot of A security training quiz question showing "Security Moments Series: Spot the Bad Link" asking what Lisa should do when receiving an unexpected email with an HTML attachment, with three answer options and Submit/Cancel buttons.

Screenshot of The AIDA Phishing Template Generator interface, which displays a customizable phishing simulation tool with template setup options on the left and a preview of a generated "Annual Bonus Announcement" email featuring a QR code attack vector on the right.

Screenshot of The AIDA Configure Training interface, which displays settings for personalized remedial phishing training, including user enrollment options, completion timeframes, knowledge refresher schedules, and notification preferences, with an "Activate Remedial Training" button to implement the configuration.

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Screenshot of The Phishing Dashboard. This displays how end users are doing at-a-glance and in comparison to peers across industries with Industry Benchmarking.

Phishing Simulations
Administrators can run simulated phishing attacks to test the effectiveness of the training and assess vulnerabilities.
Category average: 8.9
Single sign-on capability
The software system supports a centralized authentication mechanism allowing the user to access multiple systems with a single, centrally managed password.
Category average: 9
Role-based user permissions
Permissions to perform actions or access or modify data are assigned to roles, which are then assigned to users, reducing complexity of administration.
Category average: 8.8

Integration with Security Tech Stack
The product integrates with other security tools, such as a SIEM or SOAR platform, and may provide alerts for potential breaches.
Category average: 8.2
Training Gamification
Training content is available in a gamified format.
Category average: 7.8
Industry-Specific Security Training
Security training can be tailored based on industry-specific requirements, such as HIPAA, PCI DSS, GDPR, etc.
Category average: 7.8

Most Frequent Users

Top 3 industries using KnowBe4 Security Awareness Training.

Based on HG Insights installation data

View all Reviews

#1 most frequent

Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services

17.0%

92 installations of 541

#2 most frequent

Manufacturing

16.1%

87 installations of 541

“Changed employee behavior. They are less likely to click anything in an unknown email.”
— Senior Network Administrator, Kingston Technology (1001-5000 employees)

#3 most frequent

Finance and Insurance

12.6%

68 installations of 541

Pros

Extensive and diverse training content library.
Effective and customizable phishing simulation campaigns.
High ease of use and accessibility for end-users.

Cons

Some reviewers find it challenging to quantify the exact return on investment.
Mixed sentiment regarding the authenticity of phishing simulations, with some users feeling tricked.

Eric Stewart

Director of Technology and Facilities in Information Technology at Purdue Polytechnic High School (51-200 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use KnowBe4 to educate, test, and retrain our staff to go from liability in network security to become a "human firewall". Quarterly testing is completed with phishing campaigns. Users that fall for the emails are assigned short educational videos to help increase their phishing awareness.

Pros

Generates phishing campaigns that rank from the obvious to highly sophisticated
Provides timely and relevant training to users
The dashboard provides a quantifiable risk assessment of our organization. Something that can be difficult to gather with no program in place.

Cons

The one thing I would say is that users that are assigned training will forget their passwords and that becomes a bit of a hassle after a campaign
The ironic thing is that training emails after a user clicks on a campaign email is often flagged as phishing.

Return on Investment

We have created a phishing awareness culture in our organization where staff take pride in making sure potential phish schemes are flagged for review.
There are numerous instances where active phishing attempts to gain access to data or to steal funds are flagged and stopped before any real damage to our institution occurs.

Usability

Other Software Used

Adobe Acrobat, Alma SIS, Lightspeed Filter

Mike Cottle View profile

Director of Information Technology in Information Technology at NMC Health (501-1000 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We perform monthly phishing expeditions of all employees. We also require monthly Security Awareness training videos be completed by each employee. It is part of their annual performance evaluation. We also take advantage of the KnowBe4 Phish Alert button for Outlook. All employees can report suspected phishing messages to IT this way.

Pros

Keeps end-users aware of security practices that they should be employing
Makes end-users aware of the various ways that security threats can manifest themselves
Helps the organization understand how well prepared our staff our to recognize phishing attacks

Cons

The only thing we wish was available was a method to email CSV attachments directly to IT staff; rather than having to chase links. This is for report integration.

Return on Investment

We've had several reports from employees that claimed that their responses to potential security threats were the direct result of what they had seen on one of the training videos
It has actually made staff interested in the security topic. We've had requests to "binge watch" our training videos. At least one department has printed a large The Inside Man banner for their break room.

Usability

Shubham sahu

Security Consultant in Information Technology at Planful Inc. (201-500 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

This helps in getting all employees get basic security awareness training and it helped a lot from phishing attacks and many more attacks

Pros

Providing information on Latest security trends
Providing information on Common attacks

Cons

More contents on developers secure code training needed

Return on Investment

An attack can cost a huge loss , so comparatively investing on employees training and Knowbe4 is completely worth

Alternatives Considered

Coursera and Mimecast Awareness Training

Other Software Used

Mimecast Awareness Training

Michael Hernandez

Senior Network Administrator in Information Technology at Kingston Technology (1001-5000 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We currently use KnowBe4 Security Awareness Training to send phishing campaigns to our users monthly. We also send quarterly trainings on different topics quarterly. Topics include everything from Teams security to phishing. We've also focused on QR codes, as those are becoming more of a threat lately.

Pros

Customized phishing campaigns
Amount of phishing templates
Training videos

Cons

So many features can be confusing
No syncing with Azure AD

Return on Investment

So far, we've been able to avoid any security issues through email.
Changed employee behavior. They are less likely to click anything in an unknown email.
Saves time in preparing for compliance audits. Reporting helps!

Usability

Alternatives Considered

Mimecast Engage Awareness Training, Proofpoint Security Awareness Training, Cofense PhishMe and Hoxhunt

Other Software Used

Mimecast Advanced Email Security, Abnormal Security, SlashNext Mobile

Scott Newman

Sr. Director -IT security in Information Technology at Costar Partners (201-500 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

I use KnowBe4 Security Awareness Training for phishing simulation and training to help employee awareness. The issues, we and most companies face, are the advanced phishing emails and malware threats.

Pros

provides social engineering awareness
keep employees up to date
prevent malware and clicking on malicious links

Cons

more employees are reporting phishing emails
after training, there are less "clickers" with phishing emails
more "Short" training material as employees don't have time to watch longer videos

Return on Investment

helping with awareness across the board
compliance with HR training
can reach all employees and new hires

Usability

Alternatives Considered

Barracuda Email Protection

Other Software Used

Barracuda Email Protection

Cofense PhishMe

Proofpoint Security Awareness Training

Infosec IQ

Mimecast Security Behavior Management

Hoxhunt

KnowBe4 Security Awareness Training

What is KnowBe4 Security Awareness Training?

Categories & Use Cases

Media