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How to hack into an email account, just by knowing your victim's mobile number
- rip747 11y agoAll this is is social engineering to trick the victim. This can be done with _anything_ if the victim is a trusting soul.
- gesman 11y agoTitle is overhyped. "just by knowing your victim's mobile number" should read: "just by knowing your victim's mobile number AND having victim stupid enough to send YOU verification code"
- nunull 11y agoHmm. "just by knowing your victim's mobile number AND e-mail address AND having victim stupid enough to send YOU verification code"
- QuercusMax 11y agoThe only thing that really makes this novel is that we have become accustomed to receiving automated texts from random numbers we've never seen before. If texts had some way of proving identity, this would be much less likely to work.
- soylentcola 11y agoSure, but I guess I'd never reply unless I specifically had just requested a pass reset or something similar. I get that this social engineering trick is like most others and preys on people who don't think about what they're typing or replying to, but isn't that the case with a lot of similar tactics? If a malicious actor can trick someone into giving out a PIN or a password by impersonating their email host or bank or whatever, their work is relatively easy.
- softdev12 11y agoThe solution is for the official Google (et al) text to include a message about the real reason the code was sent, making it clear that the hacker's first text was malicious.
- hashberry 11y agoNever discount the threat of the human element in hacking. Kevin Mitnick was a successful hacker due to his skills in social engineering. Posters may discount this "hack"--but think about the policies and training--if any--your company has in place to prevent this type of social engineering.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]