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What is social engineering?
Social engineering is manipulating a person, rather than breaking software, to get them to hand over information, access or money. In crypto it usually means talking someone into revealing a seed phrase, approving a transaction or sending funds, often by posing as someone they would believe.
What it means for you
No genuine support team needs your seed phrase, private key or remote access to your computer, so any request for them is the attack itself. When a message pushes urgency, contact the company yourself using an address or number you already had, not the link or number in the message. Crypto sent this way usually cannot be recovered.
How it works
CISA defines social engineering as using human interaction to obtain or compromise information. Attackers build a pretext: they pose as a new employee, a repair person or a researcher, and may offer credentials that look real. They lean on urgency so the target acts before examining anything, and they collect small facts from several sources to sound more credible on the next contact. ethereum.org describes support scammers who watch public chat channels for help requests, then message the person privately offering support. Phishing is one channel for social engineering, through deceptive messages and sites; the wider category also covers calls, chats and in-person approaches.
Sources: CISA: Avoiding social engineering and phishing attacks, ethereum.org: Security and scam prevention · checked 4 October 2026
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Educational content, not financial advice. Written by hand and checked against the source named above. Something wrong? Tell us and we reply within two business days.