Focused on Phishing
Focused on Phishing
I designed this eLearning experience for organizations that are dealing with an influx of phishing attempts and a staff that needs practice recognizing and responding appropriately to phishing emails.
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Overview
Audience: Employees struggling to correctly identify phishing attempts
Responsibilities: Instructional Design, eLearning Development, Visual Design, Storyboarding, Action Mapping
Tools: Articulate Storyline 360, Vyond, Mindmeister, Adobe XD, and Adobe Illustrator
Problem and Solution
For this concept-based learning experience I considered problems that affected many different companies and organizations that I have worked with in the past. Phishing is a problem that pops-up no matter what industry or location your company exists in. The primary way of dealing with this issue is typically to send out staff-wide emails when a prominent phishing attempt has been identified. These emails warn employees not to engage with the phishing attempt and point out the indicators that identified the email as phishing. By this point many people in the organization have already been exposed to the phishing attempt and some may have already fallen victim to the ploy.
After careful research, reflection, and analysis of the problem it became obvious that the issue was due to the reactive nature of the current solution, notifying employees of an already existing phishing attempt, rather than a proactive approach, teaching them to identify and correctly respond to phishing attempts. A scenario-based eLearning solution would give employees a chance to practice responding to emails and to see the consequences of engaging with phishing emails in a low-risk environment. Not only would this help them identify phishing attempts in the future but would also show them what destructive results phishing can have on a company and an individual.
Action Mapping
I consulted with employees at several different organizations who had experience with phishing attempts as my subject matter experts (SME) in order to develop an action map. I identified the essential objective of the training and outlined the actions an employee can take when confronted with a phishing email.
Through the process of creating the action map I was able to outline not only the desired behaviors, but also the possible pitfalls that people can stumble into when evaluating an email. This helped me to focus my eLearning solution on the most common ploys individuals can be faced with in real world situations.
Text-Based Storyboard
Once the action map was completed I consulted with my SMEs to create a text-based storyboard. I wanted to make sure that the eLearning experience told a cohesive narrative while addressing the pitfalls people face when dealing with phishing attempts in their inbox. I decided the most effective way to create the scenario and make it as realistic as possible would be to create an inbox full of emails and require the users to determine what course of action to take after viewing each email. I also incorporated a job aid to assist learners on their journey, as a job aid is something that they would have access to when evaluating emails for phishing in real life.
I also felt it was important to show the consequences of engaging with phishing attempts, as many people may not understand the consequences of misidentifying phishing emails. Therefore, I decided to use an animated storytelling software to realistically (with a little humor) portray the consequences of the user's choices.
Visual Mockups
When I was happy with the verbiage in the text-based storyboard I was able to move on to visual mockups. I utilized Adobe XD to get a sense of what I could achieve visually and to ensure I had a cohesive look.
I created a custom color palette to utilize throughout the project and used similar elements and styles to make the experience fluid and immersive. A priority for me was making sure that the email inbox and subsequent emails felt realistic and mimicked real phishing emails that I and my SMEs had seen used before. I utilized Adobe XD to play around with the different iterations and decide on the one that felt the most natural and authentic.
Interactive Prototype
I took my mockups and text-based storyboard and utilized them to begin the creation process in Articulate Storyline 360. I worked on creating the experience through the first email chain and corresponding results before sharing what I created with my SMEs and requesting feedback on the usability and look.
While feedback was ultimately positive I did receive comments that led to my creating a tabbed interaction with the email. I did this so that it would more closely mimic the real-life experience of reading your email and being able to switch between emails fluidly.
Final Development
Once satisfied with the feedback I received on the prototype I worked on developing the remainder of the learning experience. I continued to adapt as I created. The most significant change I made to the project was adding a checkmark to the email once the learner had successfully dealt with the email. Not only did I believe this would give the learner a feeling of satisfaction but it would also serve as a progress marker to let the learner know what they had accomplished and what they still had left to do.
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