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Restructure the Social Engineering section - Printable Version

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Restructure the Social Engineering section - phyrrus9 - 03-01-2018

After a long conversation with @Oni on discord, I came up with a couple theories to disperse some of the SE madness that's been plaguing us. Theory #1 was to create a properly written set of suggestions for members to take it upon themselves and raise the bar in terms of the quality of their own posts. That thread can be found at https://sinister.ly/Thread-Tutorial-A-comprehensive-guide-to-high-quality-posts

The second idea stems from the root of the SE war. Some of our members think of SE one way, and others have a different definition. The issue is that these two are currently forced to share the same room, and so they clash a lot. Many members want to be able to talk about one form of it, while the others are frustrated by all the clutter of what they don't think is SE. The solution is to have them coexist. My proposal is to restructure this section. Currently it is just a single forum titled "Social Engineering", with a subforum for "Sexual" varieties. According to Oni this subsection is there to serve the purpose of separating the NSFW stuff, but we can take advantage of there already being a substructure here.

My proposal is a split idea. I want to add a second subcategory to this forum. The new structure will look like only 1 of the following 3:

#1
Code:
Social Engineering |-----> Refunds/Returns |-----> Sexual
In this case, the more "traditional" approach to Social Engineering would become the dominant use of the SE forum, with the refunding posts having their own subcategory

#2
Code:
Social Engineering |-----> Interpersonal/Traditional |-----> Sexual
In this case, it will be the inverse of #1, where the section will retain its dominant description, but there will be a separate category for traditional SE, or that that relies on psychology and interpersonal exploitation of humans, rather than policy

#3
Code:
Social Engineering |-----> Refunds/Returns |-----> Traditional |-----> Sexual
This is a hybrid of the first 2. In this case, each type gets its own section, and the general category would be reserved for helpdesks and general debate about the topic, much like we have for the coding section.

PLEASE vote in the poll. This suggestion will not get anywhere unless members can agree on what we want. There are options for all scenarios, so please vote even if you disagree

RE: Restructure the Social Engineering section - Skryptec - 03-01-2018

I have voted for number 2 as I do not think a refund/returns section is needed. Traditional will be nice to split both ways people think of it.

RE: Restructure the Social Engineering section - phyrrus9 - 03-01-2018

(03-01-2018, 08:33 AM)Skryptec Wrote: I have voted for number 2 as I do not think a refund/returns section is needed. Traditional will be nice to split both ways people think of it.

I split my vote between props 1 and 2 (you can select up to 2 options), because I believe something should be done, not quite as extreme as splitting it into 3, but the actual implementation really isn't important. I tend to lean farther onto the first however, because I'm a believer that this new form of SE is just an applied version of the old, new stuff should get its own subsection IMO.

RE: Restructure the Social Engineering section - Oni - 03-01-2018

We talked about this briefly and it's a possibility if this is something people are really keen on. If implemented, staff would have to go through pre-existing threads and move them. If it curbs the complaining, I don't mind much. #1 & #2 would be easiest to implement. Only considering it if there's a demand.

RE: Restructure the Social Engineering section - phyrrus9 - 03-01-2018

(03-01-2018, 08:59 AM)Oni Wrote: We talked about this briefly and it's a possibility if this is something people are really keen on. If implemented, staff would have to go through pre-existing threads and move them. If it curbs the complaining, I don't mind much. #1 & #2 would be easiest to implement. Only considering it if there's a demand.

As I stated in our PM, I'll happily volunteer to help with that reorganization. I'm willing to bet others would help out as well. There aren't that many posts there to move. A team of 5 people with temporary permissions to move threads could knock that out in 5 days (assuming an average of 50 threads done per day). For the most part, these threads can be identified just by their titles, so the job would likely be even faster.

RE: Restructure the Social Engineering section - Qlova - 03-01-2018

I voted for 1 but I would like to change my vote for 2. I initially voted for 1 because I believe that refunds/returns is a different form of SE and requires an extra step of purchasing an item before hand. However both require human manipulation and so really they should belong in the same category although they involve different processes - refund/return is just one method that can be used, just like a receipt generator can be used for example, but there is no need for this section - creating a different category for each method would be pointless.

I think its more important to split up the actual methods of SEing with the discussion of it.

RE: Restructure the Social Engineering section - phyrrus9 - 03-01-2018

(03-01-2018, 09:56 AM)Qlova Wrote: I voted for 1 but I would like to change my vote for 2. I initially voted for 1 because I believe that refunds/returns is a different form of SE and requires an extra step of purchasing an item before hand. However both require human manipulation and so really they should belong in the same category although they involve different processes - refund/return is just one method that can be used, just like a receipt generator can be used for example, but there is no need for this section - creating a different category for each method would be pointless.

I think its more important to split up the actual methods of SEing with the discussion of it.

I don't think you can change the vote, but we've noted your opinion. That is an interesting suggestion, it aligns more with proposition #3, where there would be a subcategory for both traditional and refunderary social engineering, and the forum that currently exists would be reserved for tutorials or information posts. Methods posts would fall under that category, and the attempts or help related stuff would end up in the subcategory

RE: Restructure the Social Engineering section - mothered - 03-01-2018

(03-01-2018, 08:59 AM)Oni Wrote: If implemented, staff would have to go through pre-existing threads and move them.

And due to the lack of knowledge with both existing members and particularly new registrations, we'll continue to do so.

Implementing changes Is one thing, awareness, understanding and competency In differentiating between all proposed forums, Is another. I'm not suggesting It won't work, but changes are only as good as those who have the capacity to comply.

RE: Restructure the Social Engineering section - zorrophreak - 03-02-2018

Have to weigh in that the main problem with one and two is something is left out. Social engineering to most new members will be seen to be explicitly warranty related stuff. Now that is fine as long as its isolated. I like this concept but believe another way you could do this is to have the Social Engineering forum be for traditional work on interpesonal/traditional work. You could have two subs with one retaining the Sexual tag and the other being Warranty/Refunding. I think this might be where you were going with the third/second ones but I'm not certain.

So long as refunding is kept out of the main forum (as it is the most troublesome category) I think clean up will help a lot.

Another thing, do we have a dedicated mod to the SE section. You wouldn't think it be something we need, but to have someone predominantly monitor the SE sections could be useful since there are so many spam threads and threads that just say "amazon denied me. help plz."

Even just a partial moderator or something who is tasked solely with this section (I believe the other dedicated mods moderate that section but still have authority in other sections, but correct me if I'm wrong.)

RE: Restructure the Social Engineering section - bringer - 03-02-2018

I am new to Sinister. I admit I came here to learn more SE techniques, but I find the refund emphasis not quite what I had in mind. At first, I was dismissive of it. But I do see the skill involved. However, I would very much like to see a section devoted to traditional SE: interpersonal persuasion, pretexting, elicitation, and so on. So I have voted for #3. Keep in mind I am new so perhaps my vote ought to not count.