Sabrina’s Money Matters

“There’s a sucker born every minute.” -David Hannum

It’s called Social Engineering -(glorified title) this is what a con artists best tool is, it enables scammers to trick you out of information that they will use for their gain. It’s one of my biggest pet peeves and I am now in a position to tell you how they do it so easily. It’s like the smooth talking salesman at the dealership, right down to the checkers at the grocery store offering you “a chance to donate to a worthy cause” at the checkout lane. It’s a skill, it’s easy to say no when the person trying it isn’t good at it.

However, the best scam artists walk away with what they need and you never realize they got something from you that they can harm you with.

According to Wikipedia:

All social engineering techniques are based on flaws in human logic known as cognitive biases.

I’ve been a bit ambiguous about my new employer, it’s not something I associate with this blog really, but soon enough I’ll be revealing more and more about it as I write about certain topics that you need to know about - and ways to protect yourself in different situations. So all ambiguity aside, I work for an attorney who started a private investigating firm 35 years ago that is now headed up by his son. I am immersed in the legal field in all facets, but not only in the courthouse sense of the law. I also work closely with Private Investigators who have various interesting and not so interesting jobs. What is investigated? Anything you can imagine.

My trade is transcription, it’s not a glorious one however it is very necessary in the world - and I’m pretty good. ;D This puts me in the rare position to hear interviews of people, surveillance reports, background investigation information, etc.

My point is that social engineering can be used for ill gotten gains as well as to learn you things you may need to know, and private investigating is the only legitimate use I can think of for social engineering.

Anytime you get a feeling that something isn’t right, be it during a conversation or you feel someone might be following you, maybe you think someone is listening in on your conversations or someone is phishing your email account, these are all forms of social engineering, retrieving information the person giving up the information may not realize they are giving out.

I’ll give you some more precise examples tomorrow of situations that are typical for social engineers… this is just a preview of what’s to come…

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