Cybersecurity can be a field where you solely rely on textbook knowledge that you have learned within a classroom environment, or even self-taught knowledge that you’ve earned by sipping on a coffee at four in the morning coding up various security tools. What does all of this have in common? That is passion; and where the Cybersecurity field shines the most. If you’ve ever had to chance to attend any Cybersecurity conference you would know that these conferences are full of creative individuals that have a passion and love for this field. Could there be any better place to pick the brains of experienced individuals than these conferences? From my experience, the Blackhat and Defcon security conferences topped that list.
Last summer I had the amazing chance to attend the Blackhat and Defcon conferences in Las Vegas, California; one of the most well-known security/hacking conferences in the world. Thanks to the Blackhat Student Conferenceship Scholarship that’s offered yearly to students in the Information Security community.
You can check out the link below and apply: https://www.blackhat.com/us-17/student-scholarship.html
The conferences have endless networking opportunities offered to students; that contain hundreds of companies, popular hackers/presenters, as well as students from all over the nation! Make sure to have a business card handy because there are tons of opportunities available; and what better place to spread your name than here?
I had a chance to meet some of the most influential people in the Cybersecurity industry, as well as speak to hundreds of companies and hear what they had to share regarding their innovative approach. Some of these people were Mubix (often seen red-teaming at competitions like ISTS & the Hak5 TV program), Tatu Ylonen responsible for the creation of what is now known as SSH, as well as many other influential figures in the industry. It was incredible getting to chance to meet these people and hearing what they had to say; and realizing that they are people just like you and I that had a strong passion to change the industry.
If anyone ever gets the chance to attend the Blackhat and Defcon conferences I strongly suggest you do so; especially if you are a student. This can be the place you earn your first internship, create new friendships, and be put on the ‘wall of sheep’ if you don’t use secure Wi-Fi on your phone. This was an incredibly comical board at Defcon that had conference attendees’ passwords written in cleartext. Before you go, make sure to bring a burner phone in case something like this happens to you!
