The Art of Social Engineering

Understand psychology-driven social engineering, arm yourself with potent strategies, and mitigate threats to your organization and personal data with this all-encompassing guide

Key Features

• Gain insights into the open source intelligence (OSINT) methods used by attackers to harvest data
• Understand the evolving implications of social engineering on social networks
• Implement effective defensive strategies to mitigate the probability and impact of social engineering attacks
• Purchase of the print or Kindle book includes a free PDF eBook

Book Description

Social engineering is one of the most prevalent methods used by attackers to steal data and resources from individuals, companies, and even government entities. This book serves as a comprehensive guide to understanding social engineering attacks and how to protect against them.

The Art of Social Engineering starts by giving you an overview of the current cyber threat landscape, explaining the psychological techniques involved in social engineering attacks, and then takes you through examples to demonstrate how to identify those attacks.

You'll learn the most intriguing psychological principles exploited by attackers, including influence, manipulation, rapport, persuasion, and empathy, and gain insights into how attackers leverage technology to enhance their attacks using fake logins, email impersonation, fake updates, and executing attacks through social media. This book will equip you with the skills to develop your own defensive strategy, including awareness campaigns, phishing campaigns, cybersecurity training, and a variety of tools and techniques.

By the end of this social engineering book, you'll be proficient in identifying cyberattacks and safeguarding against the ever-growing threat of social engineering with your defensive arsenal.

What you will learn

• Grasp the psychological concepts and principles used in social engineering attacks
• Distinguish the different types of social engineering attacks
• Examine the impact of social engineering on social networks
• Find out how attackers leverage OSINT tools to perform more successful attacks
• Walk through the social engineering lifecycle
• Get a glimpse of the capabilities of Social Engineering Toolkit (SET)

Who this book is for

This book is for cybersecurity enthusiasts, ethical hackers, penetration testers, IT administrators, cybersecurity analysts, or anyone concerned with cybersecurity, privacy, and risk management. It will serve as a valuable resource for managers, decision makers, and government officials to understand the impact and importance of social engineering and how to protect against this threat.

Table of Contents

1. The Psychology Behind Social Engineering
2. Understanding Social Engineering
3. Common Scam Attacks
4. Types of Social Engineering Attacks
5. Enhanced Social Engineering Attacks
6. Social Engineering and Social Network Attacks
7. AI-Driven Techniques in Enhanced Social Engineering Attacks
8. The Social Engineering Toolkit (SET)
9. Understanding the Social Engineering Lifecycle
10. Defensive Strategies for Social Engineering
11. Applicable Laws and Regulations for Social Engineering