Difference between Spam and Phishing Mail

Spam Mail

Spam or Junk mail is an unsolicited email. It may contain advertising/promotion details. Spam is generally sent from a compromised computer infected by a virus or worm. Such computers sends emails in bulk. Some spam emails may contain harmful links, malware or content which appears authentic but intended for misuse. For example, mail stating you as a winnner of big lottery and asking for bank account details to credit the amount.

Phishing Mail

Phishing is a type of fraud. Cybercriminals continuously try to decept people by sending them phishing mails. They want to trick user to reveal sensitive information from users like login credentials, bank account details etc. These emails appear to be an authentic sources, say from bank but are spurious accounts.

The following are some of the important differences between Spam Mail and Phishing Mail.

Sr. No.	Key	Spam Mail	Phishing Mail
1	Concept	Spam email is unsolicited mail and is sent in bulk. The primary purpose is an advertisement.	The phishing email is targeted to a few users and the purpose is to steal user information.
2	Type	Spam is a kind of advertisement tool but it is untargetted.	Phishing is a type of social engineering attack.
3	Contents	Spam mails generally contain promotional/commercial contents.	Phishing contains misguiding material and target to trick user to reveal sensitive information.
4	Equivalent	Spam mail is equivalent to junk mail or unsolicited mail or promotion in some cases.	Phishing is a crime and is equivalent to theft.

Mahesh Parahar

Published on 16-Apr-2020 06:26:45

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