In a typical social engineering attack, 

a cybercriminal will communicate with the intended victim by saying they are from a trusted organization. In some cases, they will even impersonate a person the victim knows. If the manipulation works (the victim believes the attacker is who they say they are), the attacker will encourage the victim to take further action. This could be giving away sensitive information such as passwords, date of birth, or bank account details. 

Or they might encourage the victim to visit a website where malware is installed that can cause disruptions to the victim's computer. In worse case scenarios, the malicious website strips sensitive information from the device or takes over the device entirely.

Tags: cybercriminal