Phishing Click Rate Dropped from 34% to 3% in 4 Months

A hospital group with 200+ staff had a serious phishing problem. Over a third of employees clicked on malicious links in our baseline test. Four months later, after our training program, only 3% still fell for it. That's a 91% improvement — and probably prevented a data breach.

34%

Before (Click Rate)

After (Click Rate)

91%

Improvement

Client Background

A multi-location hospital group in Gujarat with over 200 employees — doctors, nurses, admin staff, billing teams, and lab technicians. They handle sensitive patient records, insurance data, and financial information daily. Most staff use computers for electronic health records, email, and billing systems but have minimal IT security awareness.

The Problem

The hospital's IT director suspected staff were clicking on suspicious emails but had no way to measure it. When we ran a baseline phishing simulation:

34% of all staff clicked on the simulated phishing link — 68 out of 200 people
12% entered their actual login credentials on the fake page
Billing and admin teams had the highest click rates (over 45%)
Nobody reported the suspicious email to IT — zero incident reports
In healthcare, one compromised account could expose thousands of patient records

What We Did

We designed a 4-month awareness program specifically for healthcare staff:

Month 1: In-person training sessions (department by department) — showed real examples of phishing emails targeting hospitals. Kept it short, visual, and practical. No boring slideshows
Month 2: First simulated phishing campaign — sent realistic but safe fake phishing emails. Staff who clicked got immediate, friendly feedback explaining what they missed
Month 3: Targeted training for repeat clickers. One-on-one sessions for the 12% who entered credentials. Quick 5-minute video refreshers for all staff via WhatsApp
Month 4: Second simulated campaign — harder, more sophisticated templates. Also set up a "Report Suspicious Email" button in their email client so people had an easy way to flag things

How We Measured It

Baseline test (before training): 34% click rate, 12% credential entry, 0% reporting
After Month 2 simulation: 14% click rate — already a big improvement
After Month 4 simulation: 3% click rate, 0% credential entry, 67% reporting rate
Staff were now actively reporting suspicious emails instead of ignoring them

Results

Click rate dropped from 34% to 3% — a 91% improvement
Credential entry dropped from 12% to 0%
Incident reporting went from 0% to 67% — staff now flag suspicious emails
Zero successful phishing incidents since the program started
The program is now running quarterly as ongoing reinforcement

Client Outcome

"Before the training, we had no idea how vulnerable our staff were. Seeing 34% of our people click on a fake phishing email was a wake-up call. The training program was practical — no corporate nonsense, just real examples that our staff could relate to. Now people actually report suspicious emails instead of clicking them. That culture change alone is worth more than any firewall."