The Current State of Phishing Attacks against Saudi Arabia University Students

Abstract

Research into phishing and social engineering is a very interesting area since a significant number of attacks are conducted with the help of social engineering and phishing as the main vector to either obtain credentials or trick the user into executing a malware infected file. The goal of our research was to examine the students' familiarity with threats in the form of phishing attacks conducted via the Internet. A questionnaire was conducted to determine the students' ability to recognize phishing attacks and if they know how to protect themselves. The motivation behind this research is to explore the Saudian Student population's self assessment in regard to phishing attacks and to assess their capability on a limited data set for purpose of obtaining a baseline for future research.