Name Christopher Hadnagy | Role Consultant | |
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Books Social Engineering: The Art of Human Hacking , Unmasking the Social Engineer: The Human Element of Security | ||
T115 the human buffer overflow aka amygdala hijacking christopher hadnagy
Christopher James Hadnagy is an American security consultant, author and professional social engineer. He is in the field of social engineering (SE) and authored three books: Social Engineering: The Art of Human Hacking, Unmasking the Social Engineer and Phishing Dark Waters.
Contents
- T115 the human buffer overflow aka amygdala hijacking christopher hadnagy
- Professional SE career
- History with DEF CON
- References
Professional SE career
Hadnagy began his technical career with his own business, AREESA Computers.
Hadnagy worked with the team that created BackTrack (now Kali).
Hadnagy has presented and trained at events such as RSA, Black Hat, ISSA and given various presentations for corporate and government clients.
Hadnagy holds certifications as an Offensive Security Certified Professional (OSCP) and an Offensive Security Wireless Professional (OSWP).
History with DEF CON
At DEF CON 17 Hadnagy was approached to help start a Social Engineering contest for the popular hacking conference, DEF CON.
Hadnagy founded the Social Engineering Capture the Flag (SECTF) competition. Ethical conduct is strictly enforced and personal/financial information is not allowed to be targeted. Businesses and government agencies initially raised concern regarding the type of information that would be gathered and the methods that would be employed to collect it, however, after four years this has diminished.
The contest is broken down into two sections: first, information gathering and planning attack vectors in the month before DEF CON and second, a public execution of a vishing attack in the SEVillage at DEF CON. A competition report is released each year which many businesses utilize to help improve their security awareness programs. The SECTF has also researched and reported on the topics of gender in the SE field, which industries are most susceptible to SE attacks, and improvements that have been seen in companies successfully targeted in previous years.
At DEF CON 18 Hadnagy and crew launched the first SECTF and became the first contest to receive a black badge its first year. Each year the contest has grown in popularity and size.
In 2011, Hadnagy developed SECTF4Kids for DEF CON 19 with the stated intention of teaching younger generations social engineering skills In 2014 the SECTF4Kids was made an official DEF CON event rather than one of the kids' events.