Making sense of the information collected is one of the most important steps in dumpster diving. Obviously, some pieces of information will be more valuable than others. To make the analysis process go efficiently, the following information should be sought out:
- Letterhead paper – It allows for making realistic forgeries, if necessary. It may also provide value in its content and give way of the names/titles of others in the org.
- Invoices/Billing Info – Useful for knowing who the target does business with and may help during pretexting.
- Technical Documents – Information about the infrastructure of the external/internal network configuration (IPs, networks, diagrams, OS, vendors).
- Employee Information – Information such as extension listings, cubicle maps and schedules. Useful for masquerading as an employee.
- Emails – Could be useful for their content, but would provide email address naming convention, email server technology and names of other individuals inside the org.
- Electronic Media – Floppy disks, CDs, DVDs, hard drives, USB drives. Extremely valuable in finding out information that is likely not available online or via other hard/s354/sh/7654c987-e0f1-4fe1-af19-c3f1ea02e5cf/90122bbf58a9f7f2097c09af2070056e">sources. A social engineer should acquire electronic media at every opportunity.
- Shredded Documents – These documents provide the most useful information. Most office shredders turn documents into long thin strips of paper. What’s more, the shredded document is usually kept all in the same waste paper basket. As a result, typical office shredding is almost useless. Most office-shredded documents can be reconstructed.