Everyone initially anticipated that as artificial intelligence (AI) became more widespread, it would help fraudsters increase the efficacy of their phishing schemes.
The results of a recent scientific investigation on the efficacy of spear phishing with AI help are in line with everyone’s expectations: AI is making criminal activity simpler.
The study, Evaluating Large Language Models’ Capability to Launch Fully Automated Spear Phishing Campaigns: Validated on Human Subjects, compares the performance of AI models and human experts from the previous year to assess how well large language models (LLMs) can carry out customized phishing attacks.
In order to do this, the researchers created and evaluated an AI-powered solution for spear phishing campaign automation. They employed Claude 3.5 Sonnet and GPT-4o-based AI bots to scan the internet for relevant information about a target and utilize it to create highly customized phishing messages.
The researchers used these technologies to get a click-through rate (CTR) of 54%, which is unheard of in marketing departments. After receiving random phishing emails, the control group’s click-through rate (CTR) was 12%, meaning that around 1 in 8 individuals clicked on the link.
An email created by human specialists was tested against another group, and it received a 54% CTR and was shown to be equally successful as the totally AI automated ones. However, the cost of the AI-automated tools was 30 times more than that of the human specialists.
The CTR of these groups was exceeded by the AI tools with human support, which scored 56% at four times the cost of the AI automated tools. This indicates that the CTR can be raised with some (professional) human input, but is the time investment sufficient? We don’t anticipate cybercriminals to believe that the extra 2% is worth the expenditure because they are notoriously sluggish and frequently show a preference for efficiency and little effort in their operations.
In comparison to last year, when research revealed that AI models need human support to function on par with human specialists, the study also shown a notable increase in the misleading skills of AI models.
The degree of tailoring that the AI-assisted approach can give is crucial to the success of a phishing email, and an AI web-browsing agent that searches publically accessible data can serve as the foundation for that personalization.
They are given a link to a website with further information and urged to take part in a project that interests them based on information they have learned online about the objective.
Only 4% of the individuals received erroneous profiles from the AI-gathered data, which was accurate and helpful in 88% of situations.
The researchers also discovered that none of the evaluated models significantly impeded the creation of phishing emails, despite the guardrails being in place to prevent AI models from aiding thieves.
Fortunately, LLMs are also becoming more adept at spotting fraudulent emails. With only a few false alarms, Claude 3.5 Sonnet achieved a score far above 90% and identified some emails that were undetectable to humans. Even yet, it has trouble with some phishing emails that most people would find strange.
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