Social engineering – Social engineering is the art of manipulating people so they give up confidential information. The types of information these criminals are seeking can vary, but when individuals are targeted the criminals are usually trying to trick you into giving them your passwords or bank information, or access your computer to secretly install malicious software–that will give them access to your passwords and bank information as well as giving them control over your computer.

Criminals use social engineering tactics because it is usually easier to exploit your natural inclination to trust than it is to discover ways to hack your software. For example, it is much easier to fool someone into giving you their password than it is for you to try hacking their password (unless the password is really weak). Here we are going to show some steps and video, how hackers are performing social engineering attacks on your data.

After going through this article you will know, how a Social Engineer hacker is able to hack personal data in just 30 seconds.

Step 1: Background check

The first step starts with a background check on the target. The background check involves preparation of a dossier of the victim based on his social-media activity and publicly available information found online. With this information, a social engineer hacker has a fair amount of information about the victim.

Step 2: Spoofing phone number

In the next step, the hacker spoofs victim’s phone number in a call to the victim’s phone company. The hacker masks her number she’s calling from with what a customer-service representative would see as being victim’s number. This step helps in convincing the company that the caller is legitimate.

Step 3: Play a YouTube video of babies crying

She plays the video in the background to make it seem as if she’s distraught and calling from a hectic household. Once she starts talking with the customer care representative, she pretends as being the victim’s wife in distress.

Step 4: Empathetic talks and getting the needed information

She makes some excuses talking to the customer care and does some empathetical talks. Within just 30 seconds, she has the victim’s email address.

In some cases when it becomes harder for her to convince the customer care representative, she used some more small pieces of information to convince the company.