Social Engineering

Dhamija, R., Tygar, J. D., & Hearst, M. (2006, April). Why phishing works. InProceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human Factors in computing systems (pp. 581-590). ACM.

Kevin Mitnick had his first major run in with the law in the late 1980s. At 25, Kevin was caught monitoring the e-mail of MCI and Digital Equipment security officials, which led to his conviction of damaging computers and stealing software. The jury ruled him guilty and the judge sentenced him to one year in prison. (Trigaux, 2000, para. 13)

It is recommended that we conduct a test that would simulate that breach. The test results should be anonymous as the goal of the test is to improve the company's security posture in a way that improves the entire company's security. After the test is complete, the results should be used to assist in designing training for employees on understanding and dealing with potential social engineering attacks. After developing the training, new policies and procedures should be disseminated, then the training can include understanding and reviewing the new policies and procedures. After the training is completed another test should be done to measure engagement and effectiveness of the social engineering training. This information should be used to improve training. The goal of the training would be to empower employees with situational awareness skills that would assist them in identifying potential social engineering attempts and how to respond

The data breaches at Target, Home Depot are reminders to CIOs of how deadly social engineering can be. CIO’s and CSO’s realize the dangers of security problems on a massive scale. These are some deliberate security breaches that happen when an employee shares a password or loses a mobile device. An employee might access a website at work that loads malware onto his PC, which then spreads throughout the corporate network. In other cases, security breaches occur when a disgruntled employee leaves the company and takes with him valuable intellectual property that belongs to the company.

Over the last few years the amount of security breaches that have been reported have had one factor that has been prevalent in majority of the attacks. That factor is the employee’s and how they are manipulated into giving the intruder/hacker exactly what they needed without realizing it. The use of social engineering in data breaches and fraud has been steadily increasing over the years. Confidentiality, integrity, and availability the three components of the CIA triad in network security can all be compromised by the risk of social engineering.

Social Engineering has become a career for modern day cyber criminals. Thieves are waiting to prey on the vulnerable, and naïve. The situations, as devastating as they are to the victims, are very real. In some cases, unfortunately, the cybercrimes are life-altering and irreparable. This paper will highlight four real-life cases where social engineering techniques were used to obtain personal and corporate information.

Social engineering can occur anytime of the day and hour. Not all hackers prepare for a time they plan to take someone information. Hackers is constantly changing the way they hack into thins and it is very hard to keep up with the changes. In conclusion we should be aware of our surrounding and make certain that we are aware when we put our personal

Social engineering has a history of being used to collect and analyze information, however the information is commonly used for blackmailing reasons. There exist various definitions of social engineering depending on the type of attack that has occurred. Social engineering is described as the ability to deceive someone with the intention of breaching security levels (Shetty, p.1). It involves deceiving through the use of phones, computer or in-person. All that is needed is the information required for one to access the systems. Important evidence such as; computer systems is mostly disposed to to social engineering (Shetty, p.1). Often, social engineering occurs as a consequence of carelessness or gaps in security systems. It mainly

Social engineering is a way of manipulating people so that they can provide their personal information to the cyber criminals. These criminals try to trick the individuals to try to get their passwords and bank information or gain access over to that individual’s computer. Criminals think that it is easier to fool someone to give them their password then try to hack their password. Basically they target those people who don’t have any idea that their information can be misused by these criminals so they just give all of their information. These criminals gain trust of those people before they get those people’s information for their own benefit. Social engineering is one of the biggest problem that people should be more aware of so they can

Ans: Social engineering is the art of gaining access to buildings, systems or data by exploiting human psychology, rather than by breaking in or using hacking techniques. The types of information these criminals are seeking can vary, but when individuals are targeted the criminals are usually trying to trick you into giving them your passwords or bank information, or access your computer to secretly install malicious software–that will give them access to your passwords and bank information as well as giving them control over your computer.

The act of tricking individuals into divulging their sensitive information and using it for malicious purposes is not new. Social engineering attacks have occurred on the internet throughout its existence. Before widespread use of the internet, criminals used the telephone to pose as a trusted agent to acquire information. The term “phishing” has origins in the mid-1990s, when it was used to describe the acquisition of internet service provider (ISP) account information. However, today the term has evolved to encompass a variety of attacks that target personal information.

The Art of Deception is an in depth look at the vulnerability that the common man has to the social engineer. Mitnick’s perspective comes from a social angle instead of a technological one, seeing as he is known as the greatest hacker all over media and most of his methods weren’t technologically inclined but socially. A quick look into Mitnick’s background, he was an only child who had a knack for understanding the Nitti Gritty of technology. As a child, he managed to ‘hack’ the bus system in Los Angeles and travel for free, exploited telephone networks as a teen and in college, infiltrated their network and was later hired because it was either that or expulsion. These are just a few of his many hacking exhibitions. He has served jail time because he realised what he did was wrong and is now helping companies avoid similar exploitations through his security company, public talks and through his books.

The keys to prevention and detection of social engineering attacks should be included in the organizations security policy. Social engineering attacks require the same approach and security posture as another type of attacks on an organizations information and data. The organization must identify its assets, turn up span mail features, clarify the line between work and personal, develop effective access management, and conduct training and awareness of

But another meaning of social engineering that relates more to information security than political sciences is the act of psychologically directing humans in such a way to make them reveal sensitive information or perform some tasks. So this report aims at answering question with regards to the identity of a typical social engineer, what the techniques used by social engineers are, what makes a real protected system

Kevin David Mitnick was born in Los Angeles on august 6, 1963 and he attended James Monroe high school in L.A. He was a hacker, phreaker and social engineer, who was the world’s most wanted computer criminal in 90’s, He was charged for many criminal activities forfraud and computer hacking into many top companies and stealing their confidential data. The Federal Bureau of Investigation, arrested Kevin Mitnick on February 15, 1995. He spent nearly five years in a federal prison for the charges. He is now a computer security consultant, author, and an ethical hacker, who started a computer security company called “Mitnick Security Consulting, LLC” and getting paid by the companies for ethical hacking.