Skip to Content
Social Engineering: The Art of Human Hacking
book

Social Engineering: The Art of Human Hacking

by Christopher Hadnagy
December 2010
Beginner content levelBeginner
404 pages
11h 8m
English
Wiley
Content preview from Social Engineering: The Art of Human Hacking

6.6. Summary

Manipulation is a key component to social engineering as well as influence. This chapter covered areas of human behavior that spanned decades of research from some of the smartest minds on earth.

Common reactions to the thought of manipulating others might be:

"I don't want to manipulate people."

"It feels wrong to be learning this."

These comments represent the way most people think when they hear the word manipulation. Hopefully, you're now convinced that manipulation isn't always a dark art and can be used for good.

The world of influence has been dissected, researched, and analyzed by some of today's brightest psychologists and researchers. This research served as the basis of my own research to develop the information in this chapter. The section on framing, for instance, can truly change the way you interact with people, and the concept of reciprocation can shape your thinking as a social engineer and how you utilize influence. Influence is such an amazing topic, though, that volumes of books are devoted to that topic alone.

Understanding what triggers a person to motivate him to want to do a certain action and then having that action seem good to the target—that is the power of influence.

This chapter illuminated the science and psychology of what makes people ...

Become an O’Reilly member and get unlimited access to this title plus top books and audiobooks from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers, thousands of courses curated by job role, 150+ live events each month,
and much more.
Start your free trial

You might also like

Hacking: The Art of Exploitation, 2nd Edition

Hacking: The Art of Exploitation, 2nd Edition

Jon Erickson
Practical Malware Analysis

Practical Malware Analysis

Michael Sikorski, Andrew Honig
Ethical Hacking

Ethical Hacking

Daniel G. Graham

Publisher Resources

ISBN: 9780470639535