Next Steps

To be delivered 1-2 weeks before Republic is available to end-users

Email Subject: Republic: Why does it matter?

Email Content:
Before Republic is rolled out to your device, you may be thinking “Why does cyber security matter?”. However, the unfortunate truth is that we rely on technology now more than ever, meaning that it is even more important to keep yourself and others safe from threats.

Take the following example of Sarah, who is a relatively junior member of staff working in the administrative department of a UK hospital: She receives an email which looks a lot like the normal internal communication messages she regularly gets but this one is asking her to open an attachment about changes to pay for the upcoming year. When she does so, nothing obvious happens. The file just appears to be broken somehow. She makes a mental note to ask someone about it which she immediately forgets when she opens the next email and carries on with her day. Not long after this though, documents suddenly fail to open when clicked, file icons begin to change, and when Sarah hovers over a file to find out what’s going on, everything has a new file extension: .encrypted

Whilst Sarah is a fake name to protect the victim, this was a real attack that took place in 2022. The file contained malicious software which spread across the hospital’s network. It prevented staff from accessing any files, including patient records. This caused significant disruption to patient care, resulted in the leak of patient private information, and cost millions of pounds to deal with.

I am confident that you want to be able to do your job without significant disruption from costly attacks. Particularly when attacks have the potential to divert funds away from places where it will do more good. I am also sure that you want to protect sensitive information that an attacker could exploit or sell. Finally, I am convinced that you want to avoid being the victim of an attack for the benefit of yourself, your peers, and anyone else who might be affected, particularly when attacks cross the boundaries between work and home life.

This is why Republic is so critical. We are all human and just like Sarah we all have the potential to be targeted and tricked. Republic helps reduce the likelihood of that happening by being there for you when you need it.

Republic will be available for you to use on [date of deployment]. I sincerely hope that once it is installed and ready, you will actively engage with it to make sure that you are the best you can be at cyber defence.

Thank you,
[Your Name]
[Your Organisation]