By: infotechalive September 20, 2021
Common Keywords Used in Phishing Email Subjects
The phrases being used in the subject lines of the phishing emails seem like the standard ones we get in our daily lives. Those prompt the user to click fast without having much time to think about it.
Some keywords have been identified by Expel in their report, which are used commonly in the attempting phishing subject lines. Employees in organizations need to be wary of such emails flooding the mail boxes.
Malicious Emails
Expel observed 10,000 malicious mails and their finding stated that such mails use one or more of such targeted themes to make the recipients interact with the content of the mail. Business invoices are mostly used in the subject lines, for instance – “Re: Invoice” or “Missing Invoice ####” and they use genuine business names.
Other subject lines include “New Message from ####” or “New Scanned Fax Delivery for ####”. “Required” is also a common term used for raising urgency regarding a new lucrative job. Some mails use blank subject lines for the user’s curiosity to rise. Service and form requests are also very common hacks.
Spear Phishing – Specific Employees Targeted
10% of the targeted attacks turn out to be business email compromises (BEC). Phishing comprises 49% of the social engineering attacks. The job role of an individual in an organization might be a factor for targeting and those in higher roles get more of such mails compared to the others.
The subject line usually is a daily task so that the request seems like a usual or familiar routine job. Those working in the finance department might be subjected to an “invoice” themed line. If it is someone in the HR department the mail subject line would be regarding a “resume”. The higher the relevance of the subject lines, higher are the chances of the mail being opened to go through. Blending with regular activities becomes the key. So these are the Common Keywords Used in Phishing Email .
Organizations are also putting up mighty efforts to counter such attacks and these are being successful to a great degree as well.
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