SOCIAL ENGINEERING

SOCIAL ENGINEERING

Social engineering is the art of manipulating people so they give up confidential information.

Social engineers often rely on the natural helpfulness of people as well as on their weakness.

The criminals are usually trying to trick you into giving them your passwords or bank    information or access your computer by using human psychology or by secretly installing malicious software that will give them access to your passwords and bank information as well as giving them control over your computer.

EXAMPLE

The social engineer may pretend to be a technical support from one of the organization’s software vendors to gain information. The attacker explain that he is troubleshooting a network problem and has narrowed the problem to a certain computer. He claims to need a user ID and password from that computer to finish tracing the problem. Unless the user has been properly educated in security practices, they will likely give the ”trouble-shooter” the information requested.

GUARD AGAINST YOUR SOCIAL ENGINEERING

These are certain precautions which you can take to protect yourself from social engineering.

Don’t open atttachments or click on links in emails from people you do not know – Many spammers and hackers send emails to unsuspecting persons with attachments that contain viruses or include links that could take the person to a malicious site that could download viruses on your computer. Such messages are also called phishing messages (since the hacker is trying to “phish” for your information). If you get emails from people that you do not recognize, just delete them.

Be particular about what you install on your computer – Don’t install programs you didn’t intentionally download and never ever download antivirus as a result of some ad or a bogus popup claiming your PC is infected with viruses.

Learn to trust your instincts – If something doesn’t seem quite right with an email or a website, believe in yourself. With enough time and practice, you can train your instincts to be even sharper and that will help you to secure yourself.

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Fact file   Phishing is the use of forged (fake) email messages that contains that you may trust, usually a bank or other financial organisation. The phishing emails will often look exactly like you would expect a legitimate message from your bank to look. The difference is that when you submit your information you will not be sending it to the real company, rather it will be sent to a criminal gang who could then use that information to either withdraw money from your account or perform other criminal acts such as identity theft. 

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