Analysis Shows 2023 to be “Worst Year for Phishing on Record”

APWG’s Q4 2023 Phishing Activity Trends highlights 2023 as the worst year on record with nearly 5 million phishing attacks, marked by a sharp Q3 drop—partly due to the shutdown of Freenom’s free domain program—followed by a modest rebound in Q4 to just under 1.1 million; the report underscores that dismantling attacker infrastructure can materially reduce attack volume and emphasizes user-focused defenses like security awareness training to counter impersonation-based phishing.