Both social engineering and technical attacks played a big part in what I was able to do. It was a hybrid. I used social engineering when it was appropriate, and exploited technical vulnerabilities when it was appropriate.

I characterize myself as a retired hacker. I'm applying what I know to improve security at companies.

Back in my day, I would probe by hand. Now you can get commercial software that does the job for you.

Of course I'm sure half the people there hate me and half the people like me

No company that I ever hacked into reported any damages, which they were required to do for significant losses. Sun didn't stop using Solaris and DEC didn't stop using VMS.

So what I was essentially doing was, I compromised the confidentiality of their proprietary software to advance my agenda of becoming the best at breaking through the lock.

The key to social engineering is influencing a person to do something that allows the hacker to gain access to information or your network.