Social engineering is the art of extracting information from humans. It is a type of attack that has made great progress in recent years by exploiting behavior, and by finding the weaknesses in given circumstances and conditions. This attack can be effective when a human is tricked into providing physical access to their system. It is the single most successful attack vector used during red teaming exercises, penetration testing, or an actual attack. The success of a social engineering attacks relies on two key factors:
- The knowledge that is gained during the reconnaissance phase. The attacker must know the names and usernames associated with the target; more importantly, the attacker must understand the concerns of the users on the network.
- Understanding how to apply this knowledge to convince potential targets to activate the...
