Archive for October 13th, 2008

Social Engineering the Justice System

A couple friends and I have made an interesting discovery which - quite aside from its own novelty - highlights an interesting side of the “human aspects” of security which doesn’t get mentioned very often. That is, fundamentally, that most people are conditioned to automatically accept untruths - or potential untruths - which are, essentially, somehow detrimental to the speaker.

Think of it as the “why would you lie about that?” test: You’re “caught” with a fellow college student (of the same gender) in a park after it closes, by police, who ask you what you’re doing. What do you say? “Nothing”? “Watching the stars”? “Smoking a blunt”? “Looking for a little, you know, privacy by ourselves”? Here’s a hint: All four of these answers are lies, but two of these answers are likely to be viewed as lies or evasions, and two are likely to be viewed as (at least partial) truth, because they’re somewhat embarrassing or incriminating. One of them, though, doesn’t admit to anything actually illegal. See the point, here?
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Published in: General, Security | on October 13th, 2008 | No Comments »