https://github.com/dalpan/Pretexta
Pretexta is a social engineering simulation lab designed to help security professionals, educators, and organizations understand why social engineering attacks succeed.
https://github.com/dalpan/Pretexta
cybersecurity-awareness cybersecurity-education cybersecurity-training hacking-labs redteam security-awareness security-awareness-training security-tools social-engineering social-engineering-techniques social-engineering-tools
Last synced: 5 months ago
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Pretexta is a social engineering simulation lab designed to help security professionals, educators, and organizations understand why social engineering attacks succeed.
- Host: GitHub
- URL: https://github.com/dalpan/Pretexta
- Owner: dalpan
- License: mit
- Created: 2025-12-02T21:21:41.000Z (6 months ago)
- Default Branch: main
- Last Pushed: 2026-01-16T07:10:06.000Z (5 months ago)
- Last Synced: 2026-01-16T21:49:33.541Z (5 months ago)
- Topics: cybersecurity-awareness, cybersecurity-education, cybersecurity-training, hacking-labs, redteam, security-awareness, security-awareness-training, security-tools, social-engineering, social-engineering-techniques, social-engineering-tools
- Language: JavaScript
- Homepage:
- Size: 874 KB
- Stars: 22
- Watchers: 0
- Forks: 3
- Open Issues: 0
-
Metadata Files:
- Readme: README.md
- Contributing: CONTRIBUTING.md
- License: LICENSE
Awesome Lists containing this project
- awesome-vulnerable - SocengLab - SocEng Lab is an open-source adaptive social engineering simulation platform that brings academic rigor to security awareness training. (Labs)
README
### The Psychology Behind Successful Attacks
#### An Open Source Lab for Simulating Human Exploitation via Social Engineering
---
Most security tools are designed to protect systems. **Pretexta is designed to understand why humans fail.
** Modern social engineering attacks do not rely on malware or exploits. They rely on **pretexting, authority, urgency, trust, and cognitive bias**.
Pretexta was created as an **open source simulation lab** to model how thesepsychological attack techniques work in practice — in a controlled, ethical, and defensive environment.
This project focuses on **learning, experimentation, and community research**,
not on generating real-world attacks.
---
### What Pretexta Is
- A **defensive social engineering simulation lab**
- A platform to study **human decision-making under pressure**
- An interactive environment for experimenting with **pretexting techniques**
- A community-driven, **fully open source** research project
All scenarios are **fictional, self-contained, and designed for defense and education only**.
---
### Features
- **Real-Time AI Chat**: Interact with dynamic AI personas (e.g., "The Urgent CEO", "Angry IT Support") powered by **Groq (Llama 3)**, Gemini, or Claude.
- **Adaptive Psychology**: Scenarios are built on Cialdini's 6 Principles of Influence (Reciprocity, Scarcity, Authority, etc.).
- **Interactive AI Lab**: A WhatsApp-style chat interface where you must defend against active pretexting attempts.
- **Win/Loss Detection**: The AI automatically detects if you've been compromised (shared credentials, clicked links) or successfully defended the asset.
- **Mission Logs**: Detailed history of your simulations with scoring and analysis.
- **Quiz Mode**: Assess your theoretical knowledge of social engineering tactics.
- **Bilingual Support**: Full support for English and Indonesian (Bahasa Indonesia).
---
### How a Typical Demo Works
1. A participant enters a simulated social engineering scenario
2. An AI-driven attacker applies psychological pressure in real time
3. The participant makes decisions under realistic constraints
4. The system detects compromise or resistance
5. A post-mission psychological debrief explains *why* the outcome occurred
This flow is intentionally designed to fit a **short, repeatable demo format**
suitable for live Demo Lab environments.
---
### Quick Start (Demo Environment)
#### Docker (Recommended)
```bash
# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/dalpan/Pretexta.git
cd Pretexta
# Build and Start
make build
make up
# Seed Initial Data
make seed
# Access the Lab
# Frontend: http://localhost:3000
# Backend: http://localhost:8001
# Login: soceng / Cialdini@2025!
```
### LLM Configuration (Required)
To use the AI Chat features, you need an API key. We recommend **Groq** for the best speed/free-tier experience.
1. **Get a Key**:
* **Groq**: [console.groq.com](https://console.groq.com) (Recommended)
* **Google Gemini**: [aistudio.google.com](https://aistudio.google.com)
* **Anthropic**: [console.anthropic.com](https://console.anthropic.com)
2. **Configure**:
* Go to `Settings` in the Pretexta Dashboard.
* Select your provider (e.g., Groq).
* Paste your API Key and click **Save**.
---
### Tech Stack
* **Frontend**: React 18, Tailwind CSS, Lucide Icons, Axios
* **Backend**: Python FastAPI, LangChain, Motor (MongoDB Async)
* **AI/LLM**: LangChain integration with Groq (Llama 3), Gemini Pro, Claude Sonnet
* **Database**: MongoDB
---
### Contributions
We welcome contributions! Please see our [CONTRIBUTING.md](CONTRIBUTING.md) for details on how to add new scenarios, quizzes, or features.
#### Adding a New Scenario
You can add new scenarios easily by creating a YAML file in `data/sample/`:
```yaml
type: ai_challenge
title: "The Fake Recruiter"
persona:
name: "Sarah Jenkins"
role: "Recruiter at TechCorp"
goal: "Get user to open malicious resume PDF"
style: "Professional, Friendly, slightly pushy"
```
Then run `make seed` to import it.
### Open Source & Community
Pretexta is **fully open source** and intended for:
- Security researchers exploring human-layer attack surfaces
- Educators teaching social engineering defense
- Hackers interested in psychological attack modeling
- Contributors who want to extend scenarios or analysis methods
We actively encourage:
- Scenario contributions
- Research experiments
- Critical feedback
- Forks and extensions
---
### Ethics & Scope
Pretexta is designed strictly for **defensive education and research**.
- No real-world targeting
- No phishing infrastructure
- No data harvesting
- No automation for live attacks
All simulations are fictional and isolated from real systems.
---
### License
This project is licensed under the MIT License.
---
**Pretexta**
"*Understanding why social engineering works — before attackers do.*"