The  Role  of Contextualization in Individuals’ Vulnerability to Phishing Attempts

Hassandoust, Farkhondeh; Singh, Harminder; Williams, Jocelyn

doi:10.3127/ajis.v24i0.2693

Cited by 6 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 62 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…As the simulation ran in Iran, we had to respect national regulations; however, we were not subject to other data protection regulations such as the EU GDPR 5 . We took into consideration the recommendations of previous studies in these matters and a roadmap to carry out ethical phishing [61][62][63][64][65]. We did not, for instance, store any data submitted by participants on the simulated phishing webpage, and we did not use any trademark.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Phishing Happens Beyond Technology: The Effects of Human Behaviors and Demographics on Each Step of a Phishing Process

et al. 2021

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Prior studies have shown that the behaviours and attitudes of Internet users influence the likelihood of being victimised by phishing attacks. Many scammers design a step-by-step approach to phishing in order to gain the potential victim's trust and convince them to take the desired actions. It is important to understand which behaviours and attitudes can influence following the attacker in each step of a phishing scam. This will enable us to identify the root causes of phishing and to develop specific mitigation plans for each step of the phishing process and to increase prevention points. This study investigates to what extent people's risk-taking and decision-making styles influence the likelihood of phishing victimisation in three specific phishing steps. We asked participants to play a risk-taking game and to answer questions related to two psychological scales to measure their behaviours, and then conducted a simulated phishing campaign to assess their phishability throughout the three phishing steps selected. We find that the attitude to risk-taking and gender can predict users' phishability in the different steps selected. There are however other possible direct and indirect behavioural factors that could be investigated in future studies. The results of this study and the model developed can be used to build a comprehensive framework to prevent the success of phishing attempts, starting from their root causes.

show abstract

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Phishing Happens Beyond Technology: The Effects of Human Behaviors and Demographics on Each Step of a Phishing Process

et al. 2021

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The role of context in a phishing email was analysed by [61]. Students either got either an email about winning an I-Pad, or a course-related email.…”

Section: Coordinating Ddos Phishing and Ransomware Attacksmentioning

confidence: 99%

Untitled

2022

JISIS

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Recent leaks (such as Conti) have provided greater insights on the working of cybercriminal organisations. Just like any other business, these malicious actors strategically manage their processes in order to maximise their revenues. Coordinating different types of cybercrimes as part of a single attack campaign provides another opportunity to these criminal groups to improve the efficiency of their attacks. To investigate the promise of this "coordination" between cybercrimes in improving the financial gains realised by cybercriminals, we take a two-step approach. First, we perform a bibliometric analysis of past scientific literature discussing the concept of "coordination" w.r.t to cybercrime. Second, as a case study, analysing the attack chains of DDoS, phishing and ransomware attacks, we identify vantage points for potential coordination from an attacker's perspective. Based on our findings, we propose a model (COORDINATE) to identify the types of potential cybercrime "coordinations". COORDINATE considers three relevant types of coordination: direct collaborated coordination, indirect collaborated coordination, and opportunistic coordination. Given the advantages of coordinated attacks, our results suggest that one crime may provide opportunities for the next one. Coordinated attacks will become more prevalent, and that we may witness the development of a dynamic that leads to more online crime.

show abstract