Wow! eBook
Practical Social Engineering: A Primer for the Ethical Hacker
Author(s): Joe Gray (Author)
- Publisher: No Starch Press
- Publication Date: 26 Aug. 2021
- Language: English
- Print length: 230 pages
- ISBN-10: 171850098X
- ISBN-13: 9781718500983
Book Description
Social engineering is an attack technique that leverages psychology, deception, and publicly available information to breach the defenses of a human target in order to gain access to an asset. Social engineering is key to the effectiveness of any computer security professional.Readers learn how to leverage human psychology and publicly available information to attack a target. The book includes sections on how to evade detection, spear phish, generate reports, and protect victims to ensure their well-being. Readers learn how to collect information about a target and how to exploit that information to make their attacks more effective. They also learn how to defend themselves or their workplace against social engineering attacks. Case studies throughout offer poignant examples such as how the author was able to piece together the details of a person’s life simply by gathering details from an overheard restaurant conversation. Gray walks readers through the sometimes difficult decision making process that every ethical social engineer must go through when implementing a phishing engagement including how to decide whether to do things manually or use automated tools; even how to set up their web server and built other technical tools necessary to succeed.
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About the Author
Joe Gray joined the U.S. Navy directly out of High School and served for 7 years as a Submarine Navigation Electronics Technician. Joe is currently a Senior OSINT Specialist at Qomplx, Inc. and previously maintained his own blog and podcast called Advanced Persistent Security. Joe is the inaugural winner of the DerbyCon Social Engineering Capture the Flag (SECTF) and was awarded a DerbyCon Black Badge. As a member of the Password Inspection Agency, Joe has placed 2nd in the HackFest Quebec Missing Persons CTF powered by TraceLabs, 2nd in the BSides Atlanta OSINT CTF, and 3rd Place in the 2018 & 2019 NOLACon OSINT CTFs. Joe has independently placed 2nd in the HackFest Quebec SECTF, 4th Place in the DerbyCon OSINT CTF, and 2nd Place in Hacker Jeopardy at Hack in Paris. Joe has contributed material for the likes of TripWire, AlienVault, ITSP Magazine, CSO Online, Forbes, and Dark Reading as well as his own platforms.
