CSEC 456: Applied Social Engineering

A hands-on course in which students investigate social engineering attacks in controlled lab environments and develop technical, policy, and risk management responses. Topics include: social engineering mechanics, principles of persuasion, preparation, traditional social engineering attacks and defenses, Ambient Tactical Deception (ATD), false information online, ethical aspects of social engineering, and automation/machine learning support for social engineering. Students work on an individual design, exploit, detection, prevention, and deterrence in a practical social engineering scenario of their choice for their final project. Students work on designing, implementing, and testing an automation/machine learning tool for detecting social engineering on Twitter for their final project.