Pen Testers Break Into Gov't Agency With Fake Social Media ID

itwbennett writes "Security experts used fake Facebook and LinkedIn profiles to penetrate the defenses of an (unnamed) U.S. government agency with a high level of cybersecurity awareness. The attack was part of a sanctioned penetration test performed in 2012 and its results were presented Wednesday at the RSA Europe security conference in Amsterdam. The testers built a credible online identity for a fictional woman named Emily Williams and used that identity to pose as a new hire at the targeted organization. The attackers managed to launch sophisticated attacks against the agency's employees, including an IT security manager who didn't even have a social media presence. Within the first 15 hours, Emily Williams had 60 Facebook connections and 55 LinkedIn connections with employees from the targeted organization and its contractors. After 24 hours she had 3 job offers from other companies."

Comments

Security?

[Anonymous Coward]

Forget security, the real headline should be "How to get 3 job offers in 24 hours". She must have had some serious (fake) qualifications and/or a smoking hot profile pic.

Re:Because they used an attractive woman.

[jsepeta]

so really the title should be "attractive women more likely to get job offers." move along, no story here.