CompTIA CySA+ Practice Test 2026 – The Comprehensive All-in-One Guide to Exam Success!

Social engineering in the context of cybersecurity refers to the manipulation of individuals to gain confidential information, such as passwords, account details, or other sensitive data. This technique exploits human psychology rather than technology, using tactics that can create feelings of urgency, fear, or trust to influence the target's behavior.

For instance, an attacker might pose as a legitimate authority figure, such as an IT support technician, and ask an employee to reveal their login details under the guise of fixing a problem. The effectiveness of social engineering lies in the ability of the attacker to trick individuals into breaking security protocols without the need for technical methods.

The other choices describe different techniques or processes related to cybersecurity. Techniques for network security assessments and methods for analyzing code for security flaws are more aligned with technical evaluations rather than psychological manipulation, while programming software vulnerabilities relates to coding practices. However, none of these directly involve the manipulation of individuals to gain sensitive information, which is the essence of social engineering.