Social Engineering Defense Issues

Social Engineering Defense Issues






Social Engineering tactics are so successful because most people in an office environment, especially if it is a large company do not know the IT staff. Most social engineering attacks are more than likely carried out as part of Corporate Espionage in order to get a technical or otherwise advantage above the competitors. These Corporate spies will prey on certain targets, such as; receptionists, IT staff, and vulnerable employees in order to manipulate them in some fashion to get information. These tactics are so successful also because all hackers know that the weakest defense is from within at the user level, and so do most technology corporations.
The most commonly used techniques that an attacker may use to infiltrate a company is by impersonating a number of people that are usually trusted or not questioned about their presence in a facility. Most people when they are doing their job tend to not give it a second thought when they see maintenance technicians, other employees, or someone claiming to be either an authority figure such as a manager, executive, or even a police officer/security guard. There are those also that will gain employment as Tech Support to be on the inside or claiming to be a vendor or client to gain access to the building. Other techniques include some Quid Pro Quo between employees, befriending someone in order to extract information, and manipulating someone using threats. Most of these techniques involve the attacker having to be an active participant in the attack physically by interacting with people directly. There are a couple of techniques that the attacker can gather information from a distance with indirect interaction, these techniques are for example; Phishing, Reconnaissance, Public Information, Social Networking Sites, Dumpster Diving, and Cold calling.
Unfortunately there is no piece of technology that can defend against Social Engineering. However you can train employees about security awareness...

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