Sam received an alert through an email monitoring tool indicating that their company was targeted...

Whaling is a specific type of phishing attack that targets high-profile executives or individuals within an organization, often with the intent to steal sensitive information or gain access to their accounts for financial fraud. The term "whaling" is used because it targets the "big fish" of an organization. Given that Sam identified the targets of the attack as high-profile executives, the described scenario is indicative of a whaling attack.