A Practical Investigation of Spear Phishing Spam Emails: Comparative Analysis and Evaluation
Kendrick Bollens · 2024
This study examines the characteristics of spear-phishing emails to identify the common tactics used by cyber-criminals. 1) What common characteristics define spear-phishing emails? 2) How do these characteristics vary among the different phishing attempts? This review covers previous research on spear-phishing, focusing on email security and detection techniques. This emphasizes the evolving nature of phishing and the necessity for advanced countermeasures. A quantitative analysis was conducted on 100 spear-phishing emails in 2022. The emails were evaluated based on sender information, subject line, content, call to action, personalization, phishing indicators, and contact methods. The study found that high urgency in subject line, poor grammar, and formal tones are common in phishing emails, indicating reliance on psychological manipulation over technical methods. These findings highlight the need for improved e-mail security practices. Future work should include datasets with technical details such as IP addresses and email headers to enhance the understanding of phishing tactics.