On Sat, 2011-03-19 at 04:38 +0400, Hamad Ali wrote:
> > [...] The human mind can be a better filter against
> > such spam than any result of mass checks.
> One of the challenges behind spear phishing is that there is no single
> performance evaluation against it. And this inlcludes user-training
> programmes too. Why? I suspect that either Spear phish works like
> magic so that users don't even recognize it, or that people do not
> publish it to public domains as it might include personally
> identifiable information.
>
> So, it is not that software cannot detect spear, it is just that it is
> not documented. The same applies to user/human training approaches.
> None of them are documented or evaluated against "real" spear phish.
(a) Never hand out your password. Less so in mail. No administrator ever
will ask for the user's password.
The same applies to any sensitive, personal information. Before
handing it out, make sure this is legitimate [1], and you're not
using an insecure medium (which mail is).
(b) Be conscious about where to send any information. Account details
never should be sent off-site.
The basic rules against spear phishing, or actually any phishing.
Even if (b) doesn't hold due to a cracked account, (a) still does.
Yes, these are inherently harder to catch by filters. But still, well
trained and educated users can stop them dead.
[1] Like a police badge. Or an 8mm gun stuck to your head.
--
char *t="\10pse\0r\0dtu\0.@ghno\x4e\xc8\x79\xf4\xab\x51\x8a\x10\xf4\xf4\xc4";
main(){ char h,m=h=*t++,*x=t+2*h,c,i,l=*x,s=0; for (i=0;i<l;i++){ i%8? c<<=1:
(c=*++x); c&128 && (s+=h); if (!(h>>=1)||!t[s+h]){ putchar(t[s]);h=m;s=0; }}}
