The best expert in each case is the victim so there is no better person to identify what does and doesn't feel right about each given situation. The victim is the ideal person to be aware of pretexting and to be responsible for alerting everyone with photos and other details.
For the most part, beating the social engineers takes attention to detail, trusting one's instincts, and willingness to say no to requests that seem off. Stalkers take advantage of people who can't say no and who feel compelled to always be nice. They use this against us at a very high
price.
The affordability also means much less burden on everyone's budget, from the individual victim's household to the police department to the non-profit women's center to the government.
The CDC suggests improving families and relationships, better coordination of IPV survivor services, more consistent enforcement of laws against the perpetrators, and implementation of strong data systems.
It will take the government a longer time than the academic and business segments to come up with ideas to try.
Social engineering is not a difficult idea to convey even though there are many ways that the stalkers and other criminals are using the techniques.
Armed with clear examples, it's easy to demonstrate the tricks that these criminals are using to manipulate information out of the unsuspecting.
Once the initial concept is taught, it's equally straightforward to apply the specifics to the victim's particular situation.
Fill-in-the-blank forms could be utilized to make this stage quick. A website could create scenarios to test a person's grasp of the new ideas.
Since social engineering is used against many vulnerable sections of society -- children, seniors, the disabled, job seekers, immigrants -- these techniques could be generalized very easily to fit other situations.
Often con artists are reported on the news after they have fleeced many people but the victims are reluctant to come forward because they feel humiliated.
This is one of the same principles of silence that the stalkers use to keep their victims quiet if private information has been innocently surrendered but the victims now feel foolish.