What is Social Engineering? Social Engineering is the psychological manipulation of people into performing actions or divulging confidential information for the attacker. Social engineering is exploiting flaws in human beings, making the victim do things that they wouldn’t otherwise have done. Social engineering is an attack vector, a means to an end. It is not the goal but a way to get there. Humans are the soft center within the hard shells of all modern security systems. Cracking the humans is often a lot easier than cracking these systems. Firewalls: Hardly any operating systems today come without a built-in firewall. You can find them in servers, in desktops and in routers. There are even dedicated firewall devices for protecting corporate networks. Security firms spend a huge amount of money on developing firewalls and for good reason. Firewalls form the first line of defense, the hard shell that a hacker must break through in order to gain access to a system.