Pretexting

Pretexting, known in the United Kingdom as blagging, is a form of social engineering attack in which an attacker fabricates a false situation or identity to manipulate a victim into divulging private information the victim would not normally share, exploiting the human mind rather than a technological system. The Federal Bureau of Investigation coined the term in 1974 and used it in its own investigations, and the technique has since evolved from simple phone-based manipulation into more sophisticated schemes, including its use in the Hewlett-Packard boardroom spying scandal to obtain telephone records and financial information; a related variant, reverse social engineering, has the attacker trick the victim into initiating contact first. Attackers typically target people who are trusting, susceptible to emotional triggers such as fear or excitement, have a low perception of threat, or tend to defer to figures of authority. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/