INKY CEO: Generative AI Is Fueling Smarter Phishing Attacks

The phishing email didn’t look suspicious. It sounded like a recruiter, included a polite opt-out line and used language that felt familiar. But according to Dave Baggett, CEO and founder of INKY, that’s exactly the point.

Speaking at XChange August in Denver, Baggett warned that generative artificial intelligence is now being used to craft phishing emails that mimic trusted contacts and professional tone, making them harder to detect and more dangerous for businesses.

“Bad guys are using them,” Baggett said, referring to large language models like ChatGPT. “There’s a fundamental asymmetry here. If you're the bad guy, you can make one template for 10 cents or maybe two cents and send 10,000 phish. If you're the good guy, you gotta scan potentially every single mail.”

Baggett explained that while generative AI is designed to create text, its real value in cybersecurity lies in its ability to understand language. INKY’s platform uses this capability to analyze every phrase in every email, identifying threats based on tone, context and intent.

“We're not using the generative part of generative AI,” Baggett said. “We're using the knowledge understanding part…the byproduct of its training is it actually understands everything about the world.”

This approach allows INKY to detect subtle phishing attempts that traditional filters often miss, such as recruiter-style language or payment-related phrasing buried deep in a message. “Those two things by themselves are almost dispositive that it's probably a malicious mail,” Baggett said.

For managed service providers, the message is clear: AI-powered email security is no longer optional. Learn more at Inky.com.