CAPEC-420
Influence Perception of Scarcity
The adversary leverages a perception of scarcity to persuade the target to perform an action or divulge information that is advantageous to the adversary. By conveying a perception of scarcity, or a situation of limited supply, the adversary aims to create a sense of urgency in the context of a target's decision-making process.
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Explain the attack pattern CAPEC-420: Influence Perception of Scarcity: how it unfolds, what it needs and how to prevent and detect it in my systems. Use https://capec.mitre.org/data/definitions/420.html and https://cve.bz/cve/capec/420?via=ask-ai-copy, which lists recent CVEs with the weaknesses it exploits. Cite the sources.Opens a third-party assistant; its answer is its own, not cve.bz's. The prompt holds only this attack pattern's id and public links.
Prerequisites
The adversary must have the means and knowledge of how to communicate with the target in some manner.
Skills required
- Low skill
The adversary requires strong inter-personal and communication skills.
Resources required
None: No specialized resources are required to execute this type of attack.
Consequences
| Impact | Affects | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Other | Confidentiality, Integrity, Availability | Attacks that leverage the principle of scarcity can lead to the target performing an action that results in a variety of consequences that negatively affect the confidentiality, availability, and/or integrity of an application or system. |
Mitigations
An organization should provide regular, robust cybersecurity training to its employees to prevent social engineering attacks.
Related attack patterns
- Part of
- CAPEC-417 Influence Perception
Examples
An adversary sends an email to a target about a limited-time opportunity to claim a considerable monetary rew…
An adversary sends an email to a target about a limited-time opportunity to claim a considerable monetary reward. The email contains a link to a site which the adversary says is only active for a short time and to the first person to claim it. By convincing the user of the scarcity of the monetary reward, the adversary aims to persuade them to click on the malicious link in the email.
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