targeted Trojan horse

n.

A Trojan horse program sent as an attachment in an e-mail message that has a subject line, body text, and return address that have been crafted to fool the recipient into opening the attachment. Also: targeted Trojan, targeted Trojan spoofing.

Example Citations:

The Trojan horse attack, in which an e-mailed attachment — like the Trojan horse of Greek myth — looks innocuous but conceals a dangerous cargo, has been an all-too-familiar part of the computer landscape for decades. In recent years, however, a new and ever more prominent feature in that landscape has been the targeted Trojan, in which the e-mail subject line or message contains language calculated to lure a particular recipient into opening the attachment. Increasingly, targeted Trojan horses are being used to steal proprietary information, obtain intelligence to get an edge on rivals, and even, it seems, obtain access to sensitive military data.

— Lauren Aaronson, "For Love of Money," IEEE Spectrum, November 1, 2005

Banks, too, need to put in similar monitoring systems to score every single activity for risk, particularly at a time when phishing, pharming and targeted Trojan attacks are becoming more common, he says.

— Jaikumar Vijayan, "Banks urged to look at stronger security," Computerworld, November 7, 2005

Earliest Citation:

Before you run to the data center to unplug your mail server, let me assure you there are ways to fight targeted Trojan spoofing.

— Jonathan Feldman, "The IT Agenda: Battling Targeted Trojan Spoofing," Network Computer, July 22, 2004

Notes:

A Trojan horse is a seemingly benign program that contains malicious code designed to steal or destroy data.

Related Words:

crimeware

digital pathogen

Friends and Family virus

identity theft

logic bomb

phishing

malware

puddle phishing

ransomware

spear-phishing

zero-day

Categories:

E-mail

Hacking and Hackers

Privacy and Security

Spam