It's that time of year again -- Black Hat and DEF CON are upon us! Thousands of security and privacy folks from around the world will be flocking to Las Vegas this week for "hacker summer camp". This year, WISP set a goal of sponsoring 2 women in security and privacy to attend DEF CON with a travel stipend and free entry badge. We reached out to the security and privacy community on Twitter with the idea and were overwhelmed by the generosity and support we received. Thanks to our donors, in just 7 days we were able to move from 2 full sponsorships to 57! Thank you to our sponsors (below) and to everyone who signal boosted our #WISPDEFCONSQUAD efforts online.
We know you can't wait to meet our WISP DEF CON sponsorship winners, and they can't wait to meet you so we've asked them to share their thoughts below. Stay tuned to hear what they learned at hacker summer camp after we all return from Vegas.
Ian Coldwater
What are your top 5 interests in security and privacy?
Container and cloud security, DevSecOps, red teaming, CTFs.
What are you excited to see/do/partake in at DEF CON?
I'm starting an OpenCTF team specifically for women who are newer to CTFs, to help create a supportive, low-pressure space where people who are often intimidated to start can play and experiment together. I'm looking forward to being able to learn and grow with them! I'm also really excited to meet and see people, and just experience everything and take it all in. I've never been to DEF CON before, so it'll all be new!
What do you hope to learn from this experience?
I'm hoping to meet up with others in the container security space, to share information and learn from them. But I suspect that a lot of the learning I'm going to do will be stuff I haven't thought of yet.
Other thoughts?
Thanks so much to WISP, the donors and sponsors for making it possible for us to be out there! It's been amazing to see the community coming together.
Mireya
What are your top 5 interests in security and privacy?
In no particular order, my top interests are system security, cryptography (both applied and theoretical), social engineering, network security, and web security.
What are you excited to see/do/partake in at DEF CON?
There's so much I want to see and do. I'm really excited to attend talks at the villages, especially the Packet Hacking village and the Crypto and Privacy village. I'm definitely going to spend some time at the Lockpicking village and try to improve my skills. I'm also hoping to watch the Social-Engineer Capture The Flag event!
What do you hope to learn from this experience?
In short, I want to learn what people are able to break and what tools they're using to do it. I'm hoping to learn about network security and reverse engineering in particular.
Sharon Lin
What are your top 5 interests in security and privacy?
I'm interested in reverse engineering, vulnerability research, cryptography, network security, and digital forensics.
What are you excited to see/do/partake in at DEF CON?
I'm excited to learn new skills at at the IoT, Packet Hacking, and Wireless Villages, as well as learn from competitors in the CTFs. I'm also excited to meet with hardware hackers and learn about new exploits and vulnerabilities in the hardware space, especially in IoT protocols.
What do you hope to learn from this experience?
I'm hoping to make new connections within the information security space, learn from some of the most experienced hackers, and gain new inspiration for pursuing security research. I also hope to learn some useful skills and become more aware of potential vulnerabilities and fallbacks of systems currently used in the embedded technology industry.
Ch33r10
What are your top 5 interests in security and privacy?
1. Cyber Threat Intel- Tactical and Operational
2. Maldoc/Malware Analysis
3. Forensics- Everything
4. Purple Team
5. Reverse Engineering
What are you excited to see/do/partake in at DEF CON?
-Excited to volunteer for Diana Initiative and Blue Team Village
-Would love to meet other Cyber Threat Intel professionals
-Bug Bounty training thru WISP!!!!!!
What do you hope to learn from this experience?
Hoping to strengthen the community of women in infosec and to learn tricks from the experienced pros to improve my technical skills.
Thank you again to all our sponsors for making it possible for WISP to send all these amazing women to DEF CON!
*If you can only see Hewlett Foundation above, please swipe or click the right arrow to see the rest of our sponsors.
WISP will have a booth at both BlackHat and DEF CON along with several events planned for the week. Feel free to come say hi and pick up some WISP swag! We will have brand new shirt designs and the Pac-Man shirt from last year.