The Social-Engineer Podcast

Emily Brandwin may be one of the funniest guests we have had on the show.  She is an ex-CIA agent, ex-Stand up comic, present day comedy writer.  No, we are serious.

You will enjoy this conversation where:

• We find out how a haiku landed her in the CIA?
• Why did she even apply in the first place?
• Pretexting, pretexting and more pretexting - top tips from a spy
• Does Chris really own a cat suit?
• Can he truly speak pirate?
• There is just so much more....

This is one to not miss!

Emily, like many of you, is an avid reader and gives us an amazing list of books this month:

The Things We Tell Ourselves: A Novel by Victoria Namkung

Everybody’s got something by Robin Roberts

Patti LuPone: A Memoir by Patti LuPone

The Bedwetter: Stories of Courage, Redemption, and Pee by Sarah Silverman

Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhoodby Trevor Noah

Join us this month with our long time friend, Jordan Harbinger.  Jordan comes back to the SEPodcast to discuss a few important topics with us:

• How is marriage treating him?
• How has The Art of Charm changed over the years?
• How did he even start The Art of Charm?
• Was he really a lawyer?
• Other cool stories....

You can follow Jordan on Twitter here: https://twitter.com/theartofcharm or hit his website up at https://theartofcharm.com/.

Jordan recommends the following books:

The Charisma Myth: How Anyone Can Master the Art and Science of Personal Magnetism - Olivia Fox Cabane

Jayson E. Street is an author of “Dissecting the Hack: The F0rb1dd3n Network” from Syngress and creator of dissectingthehack.com. He has also spoken at DEFCON, DerbyCon, UCON and at several other ‘CONs and colleges on a variety of Information Security subjects. His life story can be found on Google under “Jayson E. Street.” He is a highly carbonated speaker who has partaken of Pizza from Beijing to Brazil. He does not expect anybody to still be reading this far, but if they are, please note he was chosen as one of Time’s persons of the year for 2006.

On today's podcast we talk about:

• A Diet Pepsi Intervention
• How does a white hat hacker land himself on NatGeo?
• How does one break into the WRONG bank?
• The stories that only Jayson could tell
• And so much more...

Follow him on Twitter at @jaysonstreet

Jayson recommends the Bloom Series books. Here are few for you to check out:

Michael Bazzell spent 18 years as a government computer crime investigator. During the majority of that time, he was assigned to the FBI’s Cyber Crimes Task Force where he focused on computer crime investigations and OSINT. He has trained thousands of individuals in the use of his investigative techniques. He also served as the technical advisor for the television hacker drama "Mr. Robot". His books "Open Source Intelligence Techniques" and "Hiding from the Internet" have been best sellers in both the United States and Europe.

On this wonderfully Honrsby-Free edition of the SEPodcast we get to discuss:

• Michael's brand new VM for OSINT-ers - Buscador
• Tips to dig even deeper for OSINT
• How far is too far with Michael?
• Michele get's dating info from Michael - hot tips.
• And so much more.

Michael recommends the book Playing Dead: A Journey Through the World of Death Fraud

Check it out and follow him on twitter at @IntelTechniques

A microbiologist turned producer, Whitney has produced commercials, pilots, feature films, and internet series for major corporations including SyFy, Verizon, The Travel Channel, Comedy Central, Machinima, and CBS. She was a member of the Academy Award winning art team on The Amazing Race,  and wore several hats during production for The Lizzie Bennet Diaries and Emma Approved, both recipients of an Emmy for Original Interactive Programming. Whitney produced Virtual Reality experiences for Kellogg’s, General Electric, Nokia, Jaunt Media,  and Google Spotlight Stories. Her passions also include choreographing Renaissance and Regency Era dance, yoga, and creating stunning visual content.

This podcast we have the chance to discuss:

• How does framing work in film?
• Does VR change the way framing works?
• What aspects do you need to consider to frame your target's emotions properly?
• And much much more

Follow Whitney at her site: www.countstonine.com

Whitney also recommends this book:  The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho

The single most asked question is "What do I need to do to be a professional social engineer?" This month is devoted to talking to our team.  Folks who had almost no SE experience before working with SECOM and now lead the market in all things SE.

Enjoy our new format while we talk about these topics:

• Why is vishing so hard?
• How can you become a master phisherman?
• Pro-tips on SE Red Teaming?
• The team's favorite books?
• What Laurie would sound like if she was a 12 year boy?
• Why does Kaz not understand Twitter?
• So much more....

Book List:

Dan: The Phoenix Project: A Novel about IT, DevOps, and Helping Your Business Win by Gene Kim and Kevin Behr

Bryan: CS Lewis - Chronicles of Narnia

Lee: Cryptonomicon Mass Market Paperback – by Neal Stephenson

Laurie: Of Sudden Origin - C Chase Hardwood

Amanda: Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking - Susan Cain

Colin: Something Missing - Matthew Dicks

Amaya: At The Crossing Places -Kevin Crossley-Holland

Kaz: Any book on Twitter

Mike: Phishing Dark Waters - Hadnagy/Fincher

Michele: Fight Club - Chuck Palahniuk

Chris: Presence -Amy Cuddy

Our guest, Dr. Brad Sagarin, professor of psychology at Northern Illinois university has studied and researched about how to combat the negative side of influence.  We have a very lively discussion (yes, Dave is at this one) about:

• What is influence?
• Can you really defend against it?
• How do you know if you are being influenced?
• And so much more...

Get more info about Brad at his site: http://sagarin.socialpsychology.org
Brad gives us a nice list of books for our listeners this month:

Ghost in the Wires - Kevin Mitnick

Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television - Jerry Mander

In the Absence of the Sacred: The Failure of Technology and the Survival of the Indian Nations - Jerry Mander

Shades of Grey: A Novel by Jasper Fforde

Paul Asadorian from Security Weekly, http://securityweekly.com/, joins us to discuss some pretty important topics.  Things like:

• What is up with Apple and the new CrapBook?
• Why does Dave plays Hornsby so much?
• Will SE be a huge vector in 2017?
• What are the major security concerns coming up in the near future?
• What about IoT?
• So much more....

As usual, it is a lively, spirited and fun chat with the SE Crew!

This time we all took turns mentioning books we love here is the list:

How To Win Friends and Influence People - Dale Carnegie

Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioral Economics  - Richard Thaler

The Prophet - Khalil Gibron

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a ****: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life - Mark Manson

The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate—Discoveries from a Secret World - Peter Wohlleben

Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ  - Daniel Goleman

Presence: Bringing Your Boldest Self to Your Biggest Challenges  - Amy Cuddy

Author, teacher, researcher and psychologist - Dr. Pennebaker is one interesting man.  He has not only performed some fascinated research but he built tools around his research and then released them free to the world.  You can even try one out at his site: http://www.receptiviti.ai/

This podcast we have a chance to ask the Doc things like:

• Can we really learn to profile people based on how they use pronouns?
• Are tools needed or can a human learn it?
• Is it good or bad to use the word "we" a lot?
• Will you really listen to Bruce Hornsby?
• And so much more...

Join us for this fun, entertaining and really educational podcast.

Dr. Pennebaker recommends a couple books for us:

The Secret Life of Pronouns - Dr. James Pennebaker

Along with the accompanying website at: http://www.secretlifeofpronouns.com/

Station 11 - Emily St. John Mandel

Robert Cialdini (http://www.influenceatwork.com) is the Regents' Professor Emeritus of Psychology and Marketing at Arizona State University and was a visiting professor of marketing, business and psychology at Stanford University, as well as at the University of California at Santa Cruz. He has written a number of books and literally defined the studies on how we understand the principles of influence.

This month we get a chance to talk to Bob (He wouldn't let us call him Dr. Cialdini) about:

• How he got started in his career path?
  Was he really about to enter pro baseball?
• What does he think the difference between influence and manipulation is?
• Can 5 words really change your message?
• There is just soooo much more - you will love this one for sure!

Bob recommends these amazing books:

• Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion, Revised Edition - Cialdini
• Pre-Suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence and Persuade - Cialdini
• Rhetoric - Aristole
• The Hidden Persuaders - Vance Packard
• Persuasive Advertising: Evidence-based Principles - J. Scott Armstrong
• To Sell Is Human: The Surprising Truth About Moving Others - Daniel H. Pink

Enjoy!  What an amazing PODCAST!