Social Engineering C2R Portal
As defined in his book "The Art of Deception", Kevin Mitnick defines social engineering as being able through; "“…influence and persuasion to deceive people by convincing them that the social engineer is someone he is not or by manipulation. As a result, the social engineer is able to take advantage of people to obtain information with or without the use of technology.”
A disturbing and re-emerging trend is the resurgence of combining technology with social engineering tactics. As firewalls, Intrusion Detection Systems, and Antivirus software , etc... become more and more sophisticated and better at their jobs, so do criminals in manipulating human emotion.
What Kevin Mitnick used as his “Social Engineering” Modus Operandi has now become a standard weapon in the cyber crime arsenal. “It has been said that amateurs hack computers and professionals social engineer.” (From Chained Exploits: Advanced Hacking Attacks from Start to Finish by Andrew Whitaker; Keatron Evans; Jack B. Voth)
The social engineering success rate is both verifiable and impressive as demonstrated by a “social engineering contest” held at Defcon 18 in Las Vegas in early August 2010.
Here is a great article on the contest from Dark Reading.
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