spear phishing

[Garson O'Toole]

Spear phishing is a colorful term, and it has raised the interest of
list members in the past. For example, James Landau sent a message to
the ADS list on 3 Oct 2007:

"Spear phishing" is a term that is new to me.  From a message to all
Northrop-Grumman employees:

<quote>
Northrop Grumman employees have received e-mails from spear phishers
recently. Spear fishing is a highly targeted phishing attack. By sending
e-mails that appear genuine to all the employees or members of a certain
company, government agency, organization or group, spear phishers
attempt to trick you into giving out sensitive information.
<message truncated>

http://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ADS-L;4VIXbA;200710031423270500A


The ever alert Michael Quinion mentioned that he included the term in
his April 2006 newsletter:

http://www.worldwidewords.org/nl/hcst.htm


Wilson Gray sent a message on this topic on 16 Apr 2008 citing a New
York Times article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/16/technology/16whale.html
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ADS-L;ejNMfQ;200804161732450400C


On Wed, Apr 6, 2011 at 5:16 AM, victor steinbok <aardvark66 at gmail.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       victor steinbok <aardvark66 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      spear phishing
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> http://goo.gl/aikr1
>> While e-mail addresses may not seem particularly vulnerable, experts say that if criminals can associate addresses with names and a business like a bank, they can devise highly customized attacks to trick people into disclosing more confidential information, a technique known as “spear phishing.”
>
> The coinage is fairly obvious--sort of an analogue of target marketing
> for phishing.
> VS-)
>
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