Phishing Attack: Types, Technical Tricks, and Countermeasures

Running head: PHISHING ATTACK
PHISHING ATTACK
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

2PHISHING ATTACK
Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
Problem description...................................................................................................................3
Technical tricks..........................................................................................................................4
Types of Phishing.......................................................................................................................4
Defense.......................................................................................................................................4
Phishing countermeasures..........................................................................................................5
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................6
Bibliography...............................................................................................................................7

3PHISHING ATTACK
Introduction
Phishing can be termed as a form of fraud in which the attacker masquerades as a
reputable entity or a person in the form of email or other form of channel communication.
The main idea, which is involved in the activity, is that the attacker uses phishing emails in
order to distribute attachments and malicious link that can perform variety of functions. The
activity may include extraction of the login details or details of the account of the user1. The
phishing activity can be termed as popular cybercrime due to the factor that it is very easy to
trick someone to click a malicious link in an email, which is seemingly legitimate. After this
activity, the hackers try to break through the defense of the computer.
The main aim of the report is to put emphasis on the term of phishing and its
associated working field. The focus would be put on the concept of the problem, which is
associated in the area and the defensive measure, which can be applied to the area. As the
concept is involved in the area of the cyber criminals, it should be of high importance to
defend against it and safe the user from the activity.
Problem description
The phishing majorly relies on a concept where the attackers indulge themselves as
some other person. This is based on human level relationship and reputation with a target
trying to uncover information. There is conflict that the concept of the phishing can be termed
as a science problem related to social, due to the factor that the attacker implement the tools
which are social to exploit the victims. On the other hand, there is a counter of the agreement
that it requires technical knowledge about the system, which is used by the victim2. Concept
of avoiding the security measures and directly making the message look very much credible
1 Marforio, Claudio, et al. "Personalized security indicators to detect application phishing attacks in mobile
platforms." arXiv preprint arXiv:1502.06824 (2015).
2 Weaver, Greg, Allen Furr, and Robert Norton. "Deception of Phishing: Studying the Techniques of Social
Engineering by Analyzing Modern-day Phishing Attacks on Universities." (2016).