What Is Social Engineering In Cybersecurity?

Social engineering attacks cost businesses millions each year. These attacks don't require complex coding skills—just a convincing message that tricks someone into clicking a malicious link or sharing sensitive information. From high-profile brands like Dior, NBA, and UFC to individual content creators, no one is immune to these psychological manipulation tactics.

In this guide, we'll explore what social engineering is, how it works, why it's so dangerous, and the most common attack types you need to watch for.

And most importantly, we'll share practical steps to protect your organization and how Spikerz can help safeguard your social media presence from these increasingly sophisticated threats.

What Is Social Engineering?

Social engineering isn't a cyber attack in and of itself—it's the psychological manipulation that makes other attacks possible. Similar to how con artists operate, social engineers use persuasion rather than technical exploits to trick people into making security mistakes.

These attacks exploit fundamental human behaviors like trust, curiosity, and helpfulness. Their goal is to gain your trust so you'll lower your guard and take actions that benefit the attacker—like revealing passwords, clicking suspicious links, or opening malicious attachments.

What makes social engineering particularly effective is that it targets individuals, not systems. This is exactly how many high-profile social media accounts get compromised. We've seen it happen to major brands and influencers like NASCAR, the NBA, UFC, Mr. Beast, and Twitch streamer Kai Cenat (just to name a few).

And the worst part is that each attack costs companies millions. According to IBM's 2024 Cost of a Data Breach Report, breaches caused by social engineering average $4.45 million in damages, making it one of the most expensive attack vectors. Even more alarming, Verizon's 2024 Data Breach Investigations Report reveals that 68% of breaches involved a human element, with over 40% of social engineering attacks coming as pretexting incidents.

How Does Social Engineering Work?

Social engineering follows a predictable pattern that organizations can learn to recognize. Here's how a typical attack unfolds:

The attack begins with communication from someone claiming to represent a trusted organization. Sometimes they even impersonate someone you know personally.

If this initial deception works and you believe the attacker is legitimate, they'll encourage you to take further action—like sharing sensitive information, visiting a malicious website, or downloading infected files.

If you do what they tell you, the consequences can be severe. At best, you might expose personal information. At worst, malware could compromise your entire device or network.

BBC journalist Nick Robinson experienced this firsthand. He received an urgent email supposedly from X claiming his content violated platform guidelines. The message contained a button to review the flagged content. After clicking it, hackers seized control of his account and used it to promote cryptocurrency scams to his one million followers.

Why Is Social Engineering So Dangerous?

Social engineering poses a unique threat because it only takes one successful attack to compromise an entire organization. A single employee falling for a phishing email can give attackers the foothold they need.

And the biggest issue is, these attacks have grown increasingly sophisticated. Attackers create convincing fake websites and emails that look legitimate enough to fool even careful users. Since they mimic normal communications, these attempts often slip past traditional security systems.

What makes them particularly dangerous is how they leverage trust. Attackers create messages that seem credible and urgent by exploiting established business relationships and brand reputations.

The stakes are especially high for content creators and businesses with strong social media presences. A successful attack can lead to:

• Compromised social media accounts
• Stolen login credentials
• Hijacked business profiles
• Loss of audience trust
• Financial damage
• Reputational harm

In many cases, social engineering serves as the initial breach point that enables more devastating attacks, making it a critical vulnerability that every organization must address.

Types Of Social Engineering Attacks

Understanding the many social engineering tactics that exist helps you recognize and prevent attacks before they succeed. Here are the most common types you need to watch for:

Phishing Attacks

Phishing attacks are the most prevalent social engineering attack vector. These campaigns target individuals through emails, text messages, phone calls, and increasingly, social media platforms.

These attacks create a false sense of urgency, curiosity, or fear to trick victims into revealing sensitive information or clicking malicious links. A growing variant—social media phishing—uses trusted platform connections to appear legitimate.

Unlike traditional email phishing, social media attacks leverage your network of connections to seem trustworthy. Their goal is either stealing personal data or gaining complete control of your accounts to run scams.

This exact scenario played out with luxury brand Dior in February 2025. Hackers took over their Instagram account to promote a fake crypto coin. This practice is getting more and more common. According to Cisco, phishing attacks make up over 90% of data breaches.

And the rise of AI has only worsened this threat, with phishing attack volume increasing by over 4,100% since late 2022 when advanced AI text generation tools became widely available. Today, 30.5% of phishing attacks worldwide specifically target social media platforms.

Watering Hole Attacks

Watering hole attacks target specific groups by compromising websites they commonly visit. Unlike broad phishing campaigns, these attacks are highly targeted.

Attackers research their victims, identify websites they frequently visit, then inject malicious code into these legitimate websites. When users visit the compromised websites, their devices get infected with malware that gives attackers access to connected networks.

These attacks often target industry-specific resources, discussion boards, conference sites, and other professional platforms. Their goal is to steal sensitive data, banking details, intellectual property, or gain unauthorized access to corporate systems.

Though relatively rare, watering hole attacks maintain a high success rate because they target legitimate websites that security tools can't simply blacklist. They often use zero-day exploits that bypass typical security measures.

Organizations that fail to follow security best practices remain particularly vulnerable. The most dangerous malware used in these attacks includes Remote Access Trojans (RATs) that give attackers direct control over infected systems.

Business Email Compromise Attacks

Business Email Compromise (BEC) attacks are a sophisticated form of email fraud where attackers masquerade as C-level executives. They attempt to trick employees into performing business functions for illegitimate purposes—often transferring money.

Such attacks frequently include a sense of urgency and social manipulation to pressure recipients into acting quickly without questioning the request. Some attackers even call victims directly, impersonating executives to add legitimacy.

The impact of successful BEC attacks extends beyond immediate financial losses. Businesses face reputational damage, operational disruption, and potential legal challenges. They must implement stronger security measures afterward, including email security tools, employee training, and stricter protocols.

The U.S. government considers BEC attacks among the most financially destructive cybercrime forms. The FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) attributes 73% of all reported cyber incidents to BEC, with cumulative losses exceeding $55 billion over the past decade. Recent data shows BEC attack volume increased 13% in February 2025 compared to January, with gift card scams representing 32.2% of financial fraud attempts.

Physical Social Engineering

Physical social engineering happens in real-world scenarios. These attacks use deception to gain physical access to buildings, restricted areas, devices, or information.

Certain roles face higher risks from these attacks—particularly help desk staff, receptionists, and frequent travelers. Techniques include:

• Shoulder surfing: Watching someone enter passwords or access sensitive applications
• Impersonation: Pretending to be maintenance personnel, IT technicians, or other legitimate staff
• Tailgating: Following authorized personnel into restricted areas

Organizations need effective physical security controls including visitor logs, escort requirements, and background checks. Also, employees in high-risk positions benefit from specialized training to recognize and respond to these threats.

Physical social engineering is often combined with digital tactics for maximum effectiveness. An attacker might use information gathered from phishing to make impersonation attempts more convincing when trying to access secure facilities.

USB Baiting

USB baiting, also called USB drop attacks, involves leaving malicious USB drives where people will find them. Attackers count on human curiosity leading people to plug these drives into their computers, unknowingly installing malware.

Once connected, the drives can deploy viruses, spyware, ransomware, or other malicious software. Attackers make these drives appear legitimate by disguising the contained files as resumes, financial documents, or other business materials.

These attacks target specific organizations by dropping infected drives near their premises. They work because people naturally want to help return lost items or feel curious about found devices.

The biggest issue with USB baiting is its effectiveness. A 2016 study found that 45% of nearly 300 drives dropped at the University of Illinois were confirmed as plugged in—one within just six minutes. A separate study revealed that while 20% of people who found drives in public areas accessed their contents, only 16% scanned them for viruses first.

Scareware

Scareware exploits fear to manipulate victims. This tactic uses fake warnings about viruses or system problems to trick people into downloading malicious software or paying for unnecessary "solutions."

This type of malware is usually delivered through pop-up ads or spam emails. Scareware warnings claim your computer has been infected and offer a quick fix—often for a fee. However, the software actually contains malware designed to steal personal data.

The damage that this type of fraud causes can be extensive. In the 2019 Office Depot scandal, employees ran fake computer scans to sell unnecessary repair services. When discovered, the Federal Trade Commission ordered Office Depot and its partner Support.com to pay $35 million in settlements.

Also, 2019 FBI data shows significant financial impact from these scams, with tech support frauds accounting for $54 million in losses in a single year,– based on 13,633 complaints the IC3 received– and scareware attacks specifically causing over $2 million in damages.

Spear Phishing

Spear phishing represents a more targeted version of phishing attacks. Instead of casting a wide net, these attacks focus on specific individuals or groups with access to valuable assets—like corporate executives or department heads.

What makes spear phishing especially dangerous is the extensive research behind each attempt. Attackers gather detailed information about targets from social media, company websites, and other public sources. They learn about personal details, job roles, work relationships, and interests to craft highly convincing messages.

Here’s how these attacks work:

Using this intelligence, attackers create personalized messages that appear to come from trusted sources—often colleagues, managers, or familiar companies. These messages include specific details that make them seem legitimate, like references to ongoing projects or recent events.

For example, an attacker might impersonate your CEO and reference a recent company announcement when requesting an urgent wire transfer to prevent account closure. The specificity makes even cautious employees more likely to comply.

After that, the employee proceeds with sending the money, making the payment, or submitting the information requested, leading to a successful attack.

The impact of these scams on businesses can be severe: financial losses, data breaches, intellectual property theft, and operational disruptions. Though spear phishing emails represent less than 0.1% of all email traffic, they cause 66% of breaches. A study found that 50% of large organizations face these attacks daily, receiving an average of five spear-phishing emails every day.

How Can I Protect Myself And My Organization Against Social Engineering?

Social engineering attacks target human psychology rather than technical vulnerabilities, making them particularly challenging to defend against. However, there are several effective strategies that can significantly reduce your risk:

1) Password Management

Strong password management forms a crucial defense against social engineering attacks. This practice involves securely storing, accessing, and managing passwords to protect online accounts from unauthorized access.

Password managers store your credentials in an encrypted digital vault accessible via a single master password. They generate unique, complex passwords for each account, reducing the risks of weak or reused passwords that social engineers commonly exploit.

For organizations, these systems centralize credential management while enforcing security policies. They make it substantially harder for attackers to compromise multiple accounts with a single password, while improving user experience by eliminating the need to remember complex combinations.

Also, strong, unique passwords for each account limit breach damage to single services rather than exposing your entire digital footprint.

2) Multi-Factor Authentication

Multi-factor authentication (MFA) adds critical security layers beyond passwords. It requires multiple verification forms to grant system access, combining elements from different categories:

• Something you know: Password, PIN, or security question
• Something you have: Physical token, mobile phone, or security key
• Something you are: Biometric verification like fingerprints or facial recognition

MFA provides powerful protection against social engineering because even if attackers obtain a password through deception, they still need additional verification factors to access accounts. This makes credential theft significantly less valuable, discouraging many attack attempts.

For maximum effectiveness, implement MFA across all sensitive accounts and establish protections against common countermeasures hackers deploy.

Important: While no security measure is perfect, MFA creates substantial barriers that deter many attackers who prefer easier targets.

3) Never Open Email Attachments From Suspicious Sources

One simple yet powerful security practice is avoiding email attachments from unknown or suspicious sources. These attachments often contain malware, viruses, or ransomware that can damage systems, steal information, spy on users, or encrypt data for ransom.

Social engineers frequently use these attachments as attack vectors, creating urgent or compelling reasons to open them. Even emails appearing to come from known contacts deserve scrutiny—attackers routinely spoof email addresses to appear legitimate.

Before opening any attachment, verify its authenticity through alternative channels. Contact the supposed sender through a different method to confirm they actually sent the file. Check for suspicious signs like mismatched link text (hover over links to see their true destination) or unusual requests.

This caution prevents the initial infection point many attackers rely on, protecting your organization from data breaches, system compromise, and financial losses before they begin.

4) Be Wary Of Tempting Offers

The old saying remains true: if something seems too good to be true, it probably is. Tempting offers frequently hide scams designed to steal information or compromise devices.

Baiting is a common social engineering tactic using irresistible offers—free products, services, or downloads—to lure victims into taking actions that benefit attackers. These might include installing compromised software, visiting malicious websites, or sharing sensitive information.

When encountering enticing offers, take time to verify their legitimacy. Search for information about the company, check for reviews from trusted sources, and look for security indicators like HTTPS connections and privacy policies. A quick online search can reveal whether you're dealing with a legitimate opportunity or a trap.

This healthy skepticism forms an essential defense layer against social engineering by making your team less likely to act impulsively on attractive but suspicious offers.

5) Back Up Your Data Regularly

Regular backups provide essential protection against data loss from various threats. If you maintain updated copies of critical information, you’ll ensure business continuity even if primary systems are compromised.

Complete backups safeguard against ransomware—a common outcome of social engineering—where attackers encrypt your data and demand payment for its release. With secure backups, you can restore systems without paying ransoms or losing valuable information.

Beyond disaster recovery, backups demonstrate your commitment to data security and regulatory compliance. They provide evidence of your security practices while ensuring you can restore systems to a clean state after security incidents.

For maximum protection, maintain backups on external drives or secure cloud services, test restoration procedures regularly, and keep some backups offline where attackers can't reach them.

6) Clean Up Your Social Media

Social engineers mine social media for information they can use in targeted attacks. The more details available about you and your organization, the easier it becomes for attackers to craft convincing spear phishing messages or impersonation attempts.

Review and clean up your social profiles by removing or restricting access to sensitive information like birthdays, email addresses, and locations. Delete unprofessional or inappropriate content that could damage your reputation or provide attackers with leverage.

Regularly audit your social media presence, adjust privacy settings, and remove outdated information to control your digital footprint. Train employees on social media risks and privacy protection to build organization-wide vigilance.

This proactive approach reduces the raw material available to attackers, making it harder for them to craft convincing, targeted attacks against your team members.

7) Use Social Media Security Tools

Social media security tools provide specialized protection for your online presence. These tools limit access to sensitive information, prevent unauthorized access, and protect intellectual property. They implement security measures like multi-factor authentication while using AI and machine learning to identify malicious activity like spear phishing attempts.

For businesses, these tools prove crucial for safeguarding brand reputation, preventing data breaches, and maintaining compliance with data protection regulations. They provide centralized visibility and control over your social media security, streamlining protection across multiple platforms.

8) Train Your Employees To Recognize Social Engineering Attacks

Employee training represents one of your strongest defenses against social engineering. Since these attacks target human psychology, educated team members become your most effective security layer.

Security training helps employees identify social engineering tactics like phishing, pretexting, and baiting. When team members understand the different warning signs, they're less likely to fall victim to manipulation attempts.

Security-aware employees spot suspicious communications and report potential threats before damage occurs. Also, regular training sessions keep security knowledge up to date as attack techniques evolve. Most importantly, these programs foster a security-conscious culture where everyone understands their role in protecting organizational assets.

For regulated industries, social engineering awareness training often satisfies compliance requirements and provides practical protection against common attack vectors.

9) Create A Cybersecurity Policy

A comprehensive cybersecurity policy establishes clear guidelines for how your systems, software, and social media should be used to minimize security risks. It helps everyone understand protective measures and their responsibilities.

Effective policies cover password management, data handling practices, incident response procedures, and acceptable use guidelines. They detail specific requirements like password complexity, information sharing restrictions, and steps to take when attacks occur.

For social media specifically, policies should define what information can be shared publicly, how to restrict profile visibility, and protocols for handling suspicious links or messages. These guidelines create consistent security practices across your organization.

If you formalize security expectations and procedures, cybersecurity policies reduce confusion during incidents and provide reference materials for handling potential threats.

Always remember, cybersecurity policies form the foundation of your security culture, giving employees clear direction on protecting sensitive assets.

How Spikerz Can Help Protect Businesses From Social Engineering Attacks

Spikerz is a social media security platform that offers specialized protection against social engineering threats targeting your social media presence. Our platform provides complete security through multiple protective layers:

Our real-time monitoring system continuously watches for suspicious activities like unauthorized login attempts. When detected, Spikerz automatically blocks access, changes your password, and notifies you immediately—preventing account takeovers before damage occurs.

Spikerz also scans for malicious links and prevents clicks on dangerous content. Our advanced phishing protection identifies and blocks suspicious messages that might otherwise trick team members into revealing sensitive information.

For businesses with social media teams, we offer team-based two-factor authentication (2FA) allowing multiple authorized users to access shared accounts securely. This eliminates the bottleneck of traditional 2FA while maintaining strong security. Team members receive only the permissions necessary for their roles, with access instantly revocable when someone leaves your organization.

Spikerz also identifies brand impersonation across platforms, flagging fake accounts that could damage your reputation or target your audience with scams. Our system detects suspicious behavior patterns that might indicate coordinated attacks against your brand.

Additional Benefits You'll See When Using Spikerz

Our automated content moderation identifies and blocks harmful, spammy, or abusive messages without constant manual oversight. This keeps your comment sections and community spaces clean and prevents malicious content from reaching your audience.

Spikerz alerts you if private data, credentials, or content appears on dark web forums, allowing quick response to potential breaches. Additionally, our platform monitors for policy violations that could trigger platform restrictions, helping maintain your reach and compliance with community guidelines.

Should a breach occur, Spikerz offers complete recovery support with step-by-step guidance to reclaim compromised accounts. Our automatic backup system ensures you never lose valuable content during security incidents.

Conclusion

Social engineering attacks target the human element of your security—exploiting trust, curiosity, and helpfulness to bypass technical defenses. As these attacks grow more sophisticated, protecting your social media presence requires a multi-layered approach combining technology, policies, training, and vigilance.

Social engineering threats are real and growing. From phishing and spear phishing to business email compromise and physical social engineering, attackers continuously refine their techniques to manipulate your team members. However, if you implement strong password practices, enable multi-factor authentication, train employees, and use specialized security tools like Spikerz, you’ll create multiple barriers that significantly reduce your attack surface.

Don't wait until after an attack to strengthen your defenses.Take action now to protect your brand's reputation, customer relationships, and digital assets from social engineering threats that could compromise everything you've built.