/r/SocialEngineering

/r/SocialEngineering is a subreddit "dedicated to the art & science of human manipulation & social hacking." In other words, it's full of Machiavellian miscreants who treat every interpersonal interaction as a mind game that you can "win" by applying the appropriate psychological cheat code!

To bend people to your will, you start with small techniques like asking people for small favors in order to "increase compliance." With enough persistence, you'll eventually be able to engineer your way into becoming the MASTER of your social circle. ("Sorry, Evelyn, I'm in charge of this sewing circle now!") Just don't be surprised if some of your friends start to distrust you because you're acting like a creepy weirdo. You can always engineer some new ones.

Members of /r/SocialEngineering - they call themselves "puppeteers" - frequently ask for new techniques, ranging from how to get more tips from your pizza delivery job (protip: get a professional pen, nothing too fancy though) to how to social-engineer your way to a swift dick kick:

Others boast about their successes, like this guy who used his social-hacking skills to score a sick discount on a mattress. This used to be called "haggling," but I guess someone decided that didn't sound computer-y and ominous enough.

One of the most upvoted threads is from a former video store clerk who heroically defrauded his workplace out of $30,000 over the course of a year. He managed to get away with it by using several time-tested social-engineering techniques, such as "acting like an annoying toddler":

Instead, I chose a different route, one to aggravate this man. I simply answered his questions WITH QUESTIONS. It went like this for a while:

[Loss Prevention Detective]: What did you aspire to be?

tweakofnature : How long have you worked for (store name)?

LP Detective : Have you ever stolen anything before?

tweakofnature : Have you ever given anything away before?

LP Detective : Do you ever get angry?

tweakofnature : Have you ever been happy?

Unfortunately, r/SocialEngineering has been ravaged by white knights, who whine about how spoofing a phone number to steal someone's spare key and sneak into their house is "mean" and "deceitful," when it's actually not only a classic trick, but also "the most social engineering thing in the entire world":

social engineering is about using known exploits in the human mind to get information or outcomes that we want. by definition it is manipulation ... this isnt the first time ive been shunned by this community for being a true social engineer and i would just really like to find a community of people like me.

In response, this "grey hat human mind hacker" launched /r/realsocialengineering, because apparently /r/SocialEngineering wasn't creepy enough. Not something you typically hear about a subreddit, is it?

– Adam "rubber cat" Jameson (@robbercat)