{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,25]],"date-time":"2026-06-25T14:16:21Z","timestamp":1782396981132,"version":"3.54.5"},"reference-count":35,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"5","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2026,5,12]],"date-time":"2026-05-12T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1778544000000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["www.mdpi.com"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Informatics"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Email spam and phishing detection is typically evaluated using accuracy-centric metrics under implicitly unconstrained computational settings. However, in practical deployment scenarios\u2014particularly in real-time and resource-constrained environments\u2014models with comparable predictive performance may differ substantially in inference latency and resource usage, directly affecting their operational feasibility. This paper introduces TERA, a deployment-aware evaluation framework that formulates model assessment as a constraint-aware decision problem. Instead of aggregating performance and efficiency into a single objective, TERA treats predictive performance as a feasibility requirement that defines an admissible set of models. Within this feasible region, operational factors such as latency and resource usage are used to differentiate among candidates through structured, multi-dimensional analysis. Experiments on benchmark email datasets show that multiple models achieve comparable detection performance, forming a region of predictive equivalence. Within this region, significant variations in latency and resource consumption are observed, indicating that predictive equivalence does not imply deployment equivalence. These findings demonstrate that accuracy-based evaluation alone may provide limited guidance for deployment-oriented model selection. By explicitly separating feasibility constraints from preference-based trade-offs, TERA enables transparent and deployment-aligned model evaluation. The framework supports consistent comparison and selection among accuracy-comparable models without altering the role of detection effectiveness as a primary requirement, thereby complementing existing evaluation practices with a structured decision-oriented perspective.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/informatics13050072","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2026,5,21]],"date-time":"2026-05-21T16:46:18Z","timestamp":1779381978000},"page":"72","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":1,"title":["TERA: A Trade-Off Evaluation and Resource-Aware Framework for Spam and Phishing Email Detection"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"13","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-0084-7538","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Chanankorn","family":"Jandaeng","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Informatics Innovative Center of Excellence (IICE), School of Informatics, Walailak University, Nakhon Si Thammarat 80160, Thailand"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-7667-2573","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Peeravit","family":"Koad","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Informatics Innovative Center of Excellence (IICE), School of Informatics, Walailak University, Nakhon Si Thammarat 80160, Thailand"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-6780-8480","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Mohamad","family":"Zolkipli","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Computing, Universiti Utara Malaysia (UUM), Sintok 06010, Malaysia"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-1785-4646","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Jurairat","family":"Phuttharak","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Faculty of Commerce and Management, Prince of Songkla University, Trang Campus, 102, Khuan Pring, Mueang Trang, Trang 92000, Thailand"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2026,5,12]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"583","DOI":"10.1007\/978-981-10-4765-7_61","article-title":"E-Mail Spam Filtering: A Review of Techniques and Trends","volume":"Volume 443","author":"Kalam","year":"2018","journal-title":"Advances in Electronics, Communication and Computing"},{"key":"ref_2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"411","DOI":"10.1080\/19393555.2021.1959678","article-title":"A comprehensive survey of phishing email detection and protection techniques","volume":"31","author":"Jain","year":"2022","journal-title":"Inf. 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