A college lecturer has launched a survey to help him teach residents how to be safer online.

Myles Dempsey, who lectures on computer science at the University College Isle of Man, is developing a portal for home users and small businesses that are ’particularly vulnerable’ to cyber-attacks due to a lack of awareness.

’Governments and stakeholders have invested a considerable amount to increase the public’s cyber security awareness, but this is rarely supported with training or educational resources,’ he said.

’People are becoming more aware of the types of malicious attacks targeted at them, but they still lack the required skills, knowledge and expertise to set up technical defences to reduce those risks.’

Mr Dempsey, who is also a student at the college, added that as information and communication technology becomes more prominent in our daily lives so does the risk of being affected by cyber-security.

’Cybercrime figures published by Action Fraud showed £34.6m was reported stolen in the UK between April and September 2018 which equates to £190,000 a day,’ he said.

’The Crime Survey for England and Wales, using data ending September 2017, showed individuals were 35 times more likely to be a victim of a fraud or cybercrime than a robbery.’

He wants to better understand the gap between what is known and what needs to be known about cyber security by island residents and small businesses to help people from being exploited.

To gain this information, Mr Dempsey is asking individuals to complete an online survey which gives a range of questions, such as what devices do you own, have you received cyber security training and what is the best way you learn about things?

From there he will use his research to build an educational resource that gives online courses on cyber security.

’These online courses will provide people with the opportunity to acquire new skills and knowledge, enabling them to become better protected from cybercrime,’ he added.

The survey is anonymous and will take less than five minutes.

It can be found here: www.cybermann.im