What is Social Engineering?
How does it work?
How to protect yourself
Conclusion
What is Social Engineering?
Social Engineering is a method to hack someone's password by tricking him or her into giving their password or information about them. This type of method usually requires no tools or software. Social engineering is sometimes referred to as "human hacking" since it is based on human motivations. Social engineering is actually almost seen on an everyday basis; it has existed since forever. This could be also referred to as conning people, fraud, or just lying. Therefore, it doesn't mean that this method is only used for computer access. In this case, it is.
How does it work?
The hacker first finds his target, and begins to set up his plans. The hacker uses human interaction to get information from the target. The method could be in many different ways, such as disguising themselves as something they're not: advertisers, employees, technicians, repairmen, workers, bank, etc. They can even disguise themselves as one of the target's closest friends. Some information that might compromise the target's security could include their full name, location, job, Social Security Number, date of birth, their secret question and answer (for email accounts), zip code, and so on.
The most common way for communication is by telephone, but email is also popular. They could also communicate in online chat, online games, websites, or they might not even have to talk to their target at all. They can simply obtain the information from places the target has been or worked, or by researching for websites that contain information, such as civil records.
Another possible way a hacker might social engineer is by phishing. It is actually the most popular way online, and is commonly used over email. First, the hacker might set up his phishing site that looks like a trustful site, and send it over the email with a link to the target. Phishing sites can trick the target to enter their account and password or other sensitive information. Common phishing examples can be about PayPal or email sign-in pages.
How to protect yourself
The best thing to do is to be aware of these things can happen if you suspected something. Here are some ways to protect yourself:
- Never give out information about yourself that can compromise your security to anyone, no matter what.
- Be aware of who calls, email, contact, etc you.
- Be careful of random strangers online who want to connect with you.
- Be cautious of strange email messages.
- Be cautious of links that are sent to you, even from trusted friends. You can try scanning the link if possible for any virus, Trojans, malware, or spyware. And always ask the person what is the link for and why they sent it.
- Don't let anyone peek or look over you when you're typing in your password at home.
- Make sure your anti virus and email server security is up to date.
- Keep all data or trash stored in a safe place.
- Do a full virus scan on the computer.
- Report the problem to the proper organization.
- Change your account password immediately. You can also change any other info if that isn't a problem.
Social engineering is one of the ways of hacking that doesn't require much computer skills so anyone could try this method. It is a very cruel way to hack. But it all depends on the victim, whether he falls for it or not. This could mean that the method can work almost instantly or it could take forever. So always be on the lookout, but you shouldn't have to be too overcautious.
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