Social Engineering: The Art of Human Hacking

Front Cover
John Wiley & Sons, Dec 8, 2010 - Computers - 360 pages
The first book to reveal and dissect the technical aspect of many social engineering maneuvers

From elicitation, pretexting, influence and manipulation all aspects of social engineering are picked apart, discussed and explained by using real world examples, personal experience and the science behind them to unraveled the mystery in social engineering.

Kevin Mitnick—one of the most famous social engineers in the world—popularized the term “social engineering.” He explained that it is much easier to trick someone into revealing a password for a system than to exert the effort of hacking into the system. Mitnick claims that this social engineering tactic was the single-most effective method in his arsenal. This indispensable book examines a variety of maneuvers that are aimed at deceiving unsuspecting victims, while it also addresses ways to prevent social engineering threats.

  • Examines social engineering, the science of influencing a target to perform a desired task or divulge information
  • Arms you with invaluable information about the many methods of trickery that hackers use in order to gather information with the intent of executing identity theft, fraud, or gaining computer system access
  • Reveals vital steps for preventing social engineering threats
  • Includes a direct URL to a free download of the world’s premiere penetration-testing distribution, BackTrack 4 SE Edition - geared towards Social Engineering Tools

Tools for Human Hacking does its part to prepare you against nefarious hackers—now you can do your part by putting to good use the critical information within its pages.

 

Contents

A Look into the World of Social Engineering
3
Information Gathering
23
Elicitation
55
How to Become Anyone
77
Psychological Principles Used in Social Engineering
101
The Power of Persuasion
181
7
259
8
298
9
339
Index
363
Copyright

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

About the author (2010)

Christopher Hadnagy is the lead developer of www.social-engineer.org, the world's first social engineering framework. In more than 14 years of security and IT activity, he has partnered with the team at www.backtrack-linux.org and worked on a wide variety of security projects. He also serves as trainer and lead social engineer for Offensive Security's penetration testing team.

Bibliographic information