Introduction

A social engineering attack is hardly ever a mistake. It cannot be compared to credit card fraud or an email hack that can be targeted at anyone. It is one of the reasons that makes social engineering a very successful attack method with less chance of failure. It is focused on a target and the attacker does not lose focus on the target until the attack is done or cannot be done. In unfortunate circumstances for the attacker, sometimes an attack will have to be called off if the attacker believes that the target has made them, or the prime objective has been lost such as the target losing money or their access to money. Security companies have been cataloguing the types of people and organizations that have been attacked by social engineers and there seems to be some consistency. Based on that consistency, this chapter will give more information about the types of...