Phishing Simulations: Key Features and Benefits 

Security Awareness Training


Mimic Real-World Attacks

The phishing simulation tool within Proofpoint Security Awareness solution allows you to conduct a more targeted, sophisticated phishing campaign that mimics real-world attacks. It provides thousands of templates based on lures and scams seen in billions of messages a day by Proofpoint threat intelligence.

You get a variety of templates that address three key testing factors: embedded links, requests for personal data, and attachment downloads (.pdf, .doc, .docx, .xlsx, and .html). And within the phishing tool, you can see average failure rates calculated from assessments sent by all customers for each template. This allows you to gauge the difficulty of a test before you create a campaign.

Customize or Create Your Own Content

You can customize the content in any template or create your own. We make it easy to replace the real phishing link with our simulated links. You can turn a real-world phishing email into a phishing test by copying and pasting the email body. With this flexibility, you can quickly and easily create timely phishing assessment tests that mimic threats seen in the wild and within your own networks.

Empower Users to Report Phishing With One Click

The PhishAlarm one-click email reporting tool is available to you at no cost. With this email client add-in, employees can report suspicious messages to your security and incident response teams with a single click. PhishAlarm Analyzer automatically analyzes your user-reported messages using machine learning and industry-leading threat detection stacks. This reduces manual threat investigation and speeds up the threat remediation process.

Create Teachable Moments

Employees who fall for a phishing test can be automatically presented with an “intervention message” (called a teachable moment). By using “just-in-time teaching” as soon as an employee interacts with a mock phishing email, teachable moments explain what happened, outline the dangers associated with real attacks, and give practical advice about avoiding future traps.

You can choose from several formats—including static and animated landing pages, short videos, and interactive challenges—for these teachable moments and to tailor the message as you see fit. A selection of static landing pages is available in 17 languages, which allows your global employees to view key messages in their native languages. You can also opt to route clicks to your own internal messaging.

Improve Efficiency With Auto Enrollment

This option allows you to spread out the distribution of phishing simulations to minimize the impact to your email servers and IT help desk. Paired with the ability to use multiple simulated attack templates in a single assessment campaign, these functions reduce the chances that employees will figure out—and discuss—the phishing test. This helps to give you the purest test of user susceptibility.

Reduce Impact With Random Scheduling

This option allows you to spread out the distribution of phishing simulations to minimize the impact to your email servers and IT help desk. Paired with the ability to use multiple simulated attack templates in a single assessment campaign, these functions reduce the chances that employees will figure out—and discuss—the phishing test. This helps to give you the purest test of user susceptibility.