As the Christmas season approaches, cybercriminals take advantage of festive distractions and heightened online shopping activity to launch sophisticated phishing attacks. Executives and employees alike receive fraudulent emails or messages designed to look like legitimate delivery notifications, holiday promotions, or year-end invoices. These attacks can lead to credential theft, financial fraud, and ransomware infections. Phishing remains the number one initial access vector for cyber incidents reported to the Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC).
Phishing attacks exploit human trust and urgency. Threat actors craft realistic emails that impersonate trusted brands, couriers, or internal departments. Common lures include ‘undelivered parcel notices,’ ‘gift card offers,’ or ‘holiday charity appeals.’ Once the recipient clicks a malicious link or opens an infected attachment, they are redirected to fake login portals or execute malicious code. Attackers may harvest credentials, install remote access trojans, or move laterally through networks to escalate privileges.
Modern phishing campaigns are increasingly sophisticated. Attackers use compromised legitimate accounts, register similar-looking domains, and bypass basic spam filters. They also target executives and finance staff with spear-phishing (whaling) attacks timed around end-of-year payments and holiday leave.
The Australian Federal Police and Scamwatch consistently report spikes in phishing and delivery scams during November and December. As per the Annual Cyber Threat Report 2024-2025, phishing was recorded in 60% of the incidents reported to the ASD’s ACSC. Australia Post and major retailers frequently issue warnings about fraudulent delivery messages and invoice scams mimicking their branding. In several Australian mid-sized enterprises, executives have inadvertently approved fraudulent invoices after receiving spoofed internal emails disguised as ‘urgent payment requests before the Christmas shutdown.’
The ACSC’s Essential Eight framework directly addresses phishing resilience through multiple layers of control:
When implemented together, these measures create defence-in-depth protection, reducing both the likelihood of compromise and the severity of impact if an incident occurs.
By taking these steps and fully adopting the Essential Eight controls, organisations can reduce phishing risk significantly while demonstrating executive leadership in cyber resilience.
