New research has highlighted the creative and occasionally unusual lengths fraudsters take to carry out social engineering attacks. Proofpoint has listed what it describes as the five strangest social engineering scams it detected last year, with campaigns including the spoofing of soccer coaches and scholars to trick victims into parting with data and money.
As organizations continue to struggle to defend information, devices, and systems against socially engineered attacks, experts say the most successful social engineering groups are usually the most imaginative. “Social engineering is inherently people-centric, and regardless of whether threat actors are targeting businesses or individuals, they’re responding in real time to the events and themes that have the attention of the wider world,” Lucia Milică, global resident CISO at Proofpoint, tells CSO.