Perform a search on the Web for articles and stories about social engineering attacks or reverse social engineering attacks. Find an attack that was successful and describe how it could have been prevented.

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Social Studies

Julia Hess

30 August, 10:15

Perform a search on the Web for articles and stories about social engineering attacks or reverse social engineering attacks. Find an attack that was successful and describe how it could have been prevented.

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Tucker Ruiz · Answer 1

In 2013, Yahoo suffered one of the biggest social engineering attacks in history, when around 3 billion customer's accounts were compromised.

An engineer with high-level access to Yahoo's database received a phishing email and without further verification, he fell for it. The hackers gained access to every single account in the system. This information was later sold on the dark web and was probably used to perform further targeted attacks.

This could have been prevented if the employee was more careful when receiving emails containing, or asking to enter sensitive information. A phishing email always has a peculiarity, something that tells you that it is not legit, even if it's just a small detail. At the slightest sign of doubt, the employee could have called his superior, or the person allegedly sending the email, to verify its authenticity.