Column by Mike Murray

I was recently at a conference with a friend of mine who was visiting Vegas for a hypnosis conference, and I was explaining to him the biggest problem with most social engineering "experts."  And, of course, because I had been talking to him about amnesia, I promptly forgot about it.

I was reminded of it when I was reading something that another social engineering expert wrote that linked hypnotic phenomena to the act of social engineering.  So, I'll share the same caveat with all of you: if someone tells you that hypnosis has anything to do with social engineering, they're a charlatan and you need to be VERY careful believing anything that they're saying.

This is said, of course, as someone who is formally trained in hypnosis and has spent a lot of years studying it as part of my training to become good at social engineering.  But, in the same way that being a great coder doesn't make you a great penetration tester (and vice versa), being a great hypnotist doesn't make you a great social engineer (and vice versa).

Let me explain.