Cybersecurity Awareness and Safe Digital Practices among University Students

Abstract

The issue of cybersecurity has increasingly gained recognition in higher education as college students are very dependent on digital technologies in their academic, social and personal life. This research explores the association between cybersecurity awareness and safe digital behaviors among college students. Data were gathered by using a quantitative, survey research design from approximately 300 students from various disciplines of the university. Data were collected using a structured questionnaire that included items related to students' cyber security knowledge and awareness, digital safety practices (password habits, phishing awareness, privacy protection, device security, and responsible online behavior). To ensure representation from different academic disciplines stratified sampling was used. Frequency distributions, mean scores, correlation analysis and logistic regression were used to analyze the collected data. The aim of the study is to determine if a higher level of cybersecurity awareness correlates with safer online behaviors and to identify factors that are most likely to predict students' use of online behaviors that are safer. The results will help to increase the understanding of cybersecurity behavior in a university context and will give valuable information for the development of targeted cybersecurity awareness programs, digital literacy programs, and institutional cybersecurity policies. This study underscores the need to integrate cyber security knowledge with hands-on behaviors to mitigate the risk of dealing with phishing, privacy breaches, low authentication, malware, and other typical forms of cyber security threats students face.