Social Engineering Blogs

An Aggregator for Blogs About Social Engineering and Related Fields

Deception Robots

Surveillance has been power boosted to a new level.

Lockheed Martin’s Advanced Technology Laboratory has developed a “spybot”.  Ieee spectrum inside technology has the scoop.

Lockheed’s new robotic creation knows how to operate incognito around humans.  It actually listens for humans, guesses where they might be looking and then finds itself a hiding spot.

How can it be so sneaky, you ask?  It is equipped with a 3D laser scanner.  It also has an array of acoustic sensors that allow it to localize footsteps and voices.

Lockheed Martin’s robot is not the first of its kind; however, it is on technology’s cutting edge.  Georgia Tech also created a “spybot” , which uses deliberately deceptive tactics to fool other robots and humans.

Is covert robotics now emerging as power field of engineering?  This technology is unique because these robots can build a computer program of their surrounding s, incorporating information on line of sight so that it can covertly map its environment in 3D.

According to NewScientist.com , Brian Satterfield, lead engineer, stated that the robot was designed to operate within four constraints:  “ Avoiding visible detection by sentries of known locations, avoiding potential detection by sentries whose positions were unknown, avoiding areas in which the robot would have no means of escape and as this robot was designed to run at night, avoiding areas that were well lit”

Video of spybot:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Lie to Me is filled with “Lies to You” -Dr. Maureen O’Sullivan

Some of you may know the late Dr. Maureen O’Sullivan, who was a Professor Emeritus of the University of San Francisco.

Dr. O’Sullivan is widely known for her work with Dr. Paul Ekman on the “Wizards Project”, where they identified Truth Wizards. Truth Wizards are those that are exceptionally good at detecting deception. One of these truth wizards, Eyes for Lies, has a popular blog where she comments on current new events.

We came across this informative lecture by Dr. O’Sullivan where she speaks about the TV show “Lie to Me” and her career researching human emotion and lie detection.

Humintell director Dr. Matsumoto has also done research with Dr. O’Sullivan. Notably in 2008, they co-wrote a chapter in the Handbook of Emotion called Facial Expressions of Emotion. The chapter was written with other researchers Dr. Dacher Keltner, Dr. Michelle N. Shiota, and Dr. Mark Frank. You can read the complete chapter here.

Thanks to Steve for the link!

Click here to view the embedded video.

Body Language & Work

A recent article on an Australian website delineates how a person’s body language is interpreted by others.

Body language expert David Alssema, doles out the five worst body gestures during an interview.  They are:  not enough or too much eye contact, slouching, fidgeting or touching things, crotch display or foot on leg position and hands behind your head or arms folded.

Alssema suggests that one always match the interviewer’s level of eye contact and sit with their hands in their lap.

Suggestions for women in male dominated fields:  have your desk facing the door from a corner in your office, always make eye contact and match a man’s handshake, lean forward when listening and stand straight when speaking.

Alssema goes on to state that women are twice as good at reading body language than men.  Harvard research suggests that when reading expressions and decoding situations, women were correct 87% of the time while men scored only 42%.

What do you think about body language in the work force?

Joe Navarro , a former FBI agent and non-verbal expert, also has some very interesting and insightful remarks on body language and its influence on others.  Here is his video about the Art of Influence.

Click here to view the embedded video.

To learn more about body language check out this video:  David Alsemma Analysis or view our previous post on lying during an interview.