{"id":170904,"date":"2023-06-19T05:16:10","date_gmt":"2023-06-19T12:16:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mcafee.com\/blogs\/?p=170904"},"modified":"2024-11-19T07:42:08","modified_gmt":"2024-11-19T15:42:08","slug":"social-engineering-the-scammers-secret-weapon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mcafee.com\/blogs\/privacy-identity-protection\/social-engineering-the-scammers-secret-weapon\/","title":{"rendered":"Social Engineering\u2014The Scammer\u2019s Secret Weapon"},"content":{"rendered":"

Social engineering. It\u2019s a con game. And a con game by any other name stings just as badly.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Like any form of con, social engineering dupes their victims by playing on their emotions. Fear, excitement, and surprise. And they prey on human nature as well. The desire to help others, recognizing authority, and even the dream of hitting it big in the lottery. All of this comes into play in social engineering.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

By design, the scammers who employ social engineering do so in an attempt to bilk people out of their personal information, their money, or both. More broadly, they\u2019re designed to give scammers access\u2014to a credit card, bank account, proprietary company information, and even physical access to a building or restricted space in the case of tailgating attacks. In this way, social engineering is an attack technique rather than a specific type of attack.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Several types of attacks employ social engineering:<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n