Essential Tips & Cybersecurity Principles

Avoid Eliciting Fear in viewers

Enhance the quality of cybersafety reporting by avoiding fear-based narratives and focusing on factual, informative headlines. This approach builds viewers’ trust and engagement by providing clear, concise answers about cybersecurity incidents. Engaging in critical thinking and maintaining professional integrity will result in insightful journalism that educates and informs without resorting to fear, uncertainty, and doubt (FUD).

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avoid eliciting fear in viewers with a group of people working on an article

Tip

Using fear, uncertainty, and doubt (FUD) in cybersecurity reporting undermines the quality of journalism and erodes the viewers’ trust.

Key Points

  • FUD-driven headlines reduce content to clickbait.
  • Sensible, informative journalism is needed to maintain reader trust and provide value.
  • This disincentivize further reading and fail to educate the audience effectively.
  • Interview certified professionals and ask targeted questions about the breach.
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What

What allowed the breach?

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Why

Explain clearly why the breach occurred.

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How

Describe how it might impact the audience.

Essential Questions

Use these essential questions as a guide to write articles on cybersecurity that are well-informed, balanced, and trustworthy. By keeping these principles in mind, journalists can produce balanced, credible stories that resonate with and inform their viewers.

Using industry news and company press releases, clearly describe the impact it had on the specific brand.

Technical analysis reports from cybersecurity firms or experts who have analyzed the breach, incident response plans as well as regulatory filings and statements that may have been issued about the incident are places to start.

Get familiar with different types of scams:

Company disclosures, regulatory reports as well as customer notifications that are sent to affected customers are places to start.

In many cases, it may take a wide-ranging effort that should not shy away from recommending legal reform and citing examples of effective government strategies or law enforcement collaboration.

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