Social Engineering. Recognize This and You’ll Recognize 99% Of All Scams
Social engineering uses human psychology to manipulate emotions and deceive people causing them to take actions that further a fraudulent cause.
If you can recognize social engineering, you can avoid nearly any scam. Scammers depend on human emotion and human error. Fear, a sense of urgency, love, and greed are all powerful emotions that can cause a person to act in ways that will harm them.
Let me give you an example. If I were to text you and, as a stranger, ask for your bank account credentials (username and password), I doubt you would respond.
But, if I send you a text that says someone is trying to transfer $5,000 from your bank account to an overseas account and tells you to call a number if you hadn’t authorized the transfer, you might. If you call me and I pretend to be with the bank’s fraud department and assure you I can fix the problem, I might gain your trust– because you are in fear. I might be able to have you “verify” your username and password so that I can confirm your identity. I’ve used social engineering to cause you to act in fear and turn your natural wariness into trust and reliance on my authority.
Social engineering works. Millions of victims lose billions of their savings and their identity every year. No hacking was necessary—only human error. Human error is the root cause of the spread of viruses and malware and the success of scams of all types.