Rite of Passage: From BSides Volunteer to Black Hat Asia

tws okay so um I'm blessing uh recent information SEC Insurance graduate now working for Net One based off of Zim uh passionate it cyber security anything to do with hacking yeah uh also part of a group of community building uh platforms uh I was part of the Microsoft learn student ambassadors Community part of the GitHub campus experts so basically what that is uh you get support from Microsoft get support from GitHub to be in a position to host events similar to this but exclusively for undergraduate University students right so it's a it's a global thing given to University students that um still enrolled so yeah uh passion's there if anyone's interested about talking about anything to do with movies

okay so the very beginning this talk is about my trip to blackout Asia which in a way in a large way started at pides Cape Town um simply so LinkedIn post uh besides Cape Town wanted Volunteers in 2023 please note I'm based in Harari right in z uh I had no plans of um how I was going to get here but I showed interest in coming for the conference so I reached out to the organizers they said uh you know what uh let's give it a shot not sure if they even had a contingency for outside of South Africa volunteers but that's what happened figure it out yeah you figured it out yeah so yeah got to volunteer because I

got a free entrance ticket but I made my way to Cape Town regardless uh it was an amazing experience got to meet new people uh shared laughes of course and yeah that was sort of like my way of trying to be immersed within communities regarding cyber security the idea was I think I gave a background I'm part of a lot of student communities but in most cases they tend to focus on Technologies like programming cloud computing all that good stuff security conferences on the other hand as you may know so Africa is you may be way better but obviously for every 10 developer conferences you have like one secret conference right so yeah the reason why I came to bsides was

because I felt I needed a community that focused on cyber security exclusively so yeah volunteering was amazing basically all I did was assist organizers to the registration and all that but I also participated in the scavenger hunt which is mostly just running around the building looking for looking for QR codes right um I had started on ctfs but I wasn't that good and I didn't think I had the confidence to sort of like participate this year I tried it I didn't do the scavenger HT I'm doing the cgf again I'm not the best but I'm in the top 10 so that's something yeah [Applause] so yeah this is the fluting part so be ready pictures this is from last

year um right of passage so for those that are not exactly sure what this is it's an initiative by bsides where they sponsor one student to attend one of these conferences either Defcon or blackhe hat which are essentially the largest security conferences in the world the idea of this is simply to uplift students to groom their passion in cyber security so yeah that is why it matters and around I came for bides in December 2023 around April I saw another LinkedIn post because apparently I have an unhealthy obsession with LinkedIn and being thrilled to announce random things so yeah saw a LinkedIn post uh from blackhead that they would give students scholarships to attend the

conference uh applied for that again I wasn't the best candidate I was just passionate and part of my volunteering experience and general experience here at blacket is what made my application strong so that's one of the other benefits why you should volunteer anyway uh um applied for blackout Asia got the scholarship back it was worth $3,000 but apparently the scholarship only covers attendance into the conference and not the actual plane ticket or accommodation so that's when the bsides team came in I I was thrilled to announce on LinkedIn that I got the scholarship but but I didn't um I actually mentioned that I won't be at ending because there's an option that you can actually do the whole conference

thing online through this platform right Charles just gave a shout said I should reach out to him this was 2 weeks before the conference right so in a space of two weeks uh besides Cape Town managed to cover my flights for the trip managed to cover my accommodation give me a stien or flight thousands yeah and yeah um um that's how I got to go to to to blackout Asia so my experience yes like Roberto mentioned earlier you get to a conference you attend talks but 50 to 80% of them don't make sense you're just in there nodding your head seeing code and all that fascinating yes but it may not be uh it may not give that much

educational value to you but that doesn't necessarily mean that it's not valuable right that's what I've been learning from these conferences I came here last year uh got into a bunch of these workshops yes it it it make sense last year there was um Marin G right from from elastic I joined that workshop for elastic sock I'd never heard of the two I'd never used it before I got in played around with it for a whole day 9 10 months later I I think from from the profile if you read my profile I I actually worked for for for an audit firm recently but I switched to a telecommunications company the first thing they told me to learn to use was

elastic sock so You' imagine right it didn't make sense at that point but just muscle memory made it all the more better yeah I even told them that I did elastic at bsides I was flexing and it worked so yeah made some amazing friends I was still with B Zim that time for some weird reason like I said if you are um if you're often thrilled to announce things on LinkedIn people tend to watch so I got a message from the cyber security director at BDO Singapore say they're interested in just having a chat that was amazing because where I was I didn't really expect it big people looking out for you it was amazing yeah so I got to visit

their offices and all that it was fun stuff yeah and traveling alone is a bad idea I've experienced that so for those this is a quick side note for those that travel alone always have a suitcase you see that thingy that that goes up yeah you phone can yeah it works it works magic so yeah uh more flaunting fun stuff yeah this is just evidence so that Roberto doesn't think I sto the money I was there

okay so why this talk right first thing don't ever undermine the power of being involved with communities right and here's one side note that I've always told people well community members I have never really had an opportunity to speak in front of Industry professionals most times I mostly do student communities and with student communities it's mostly to do with how do I get started right um I I have these these modules that I'm doing in University they're not completely making sense I'm doing programming others are good at it and I'm trying and it's not working so how do I get good right first thing get yourself involved to the community there are a lot of

those and apparently bides doesn't allow marketing pitch can I do that can I do a Sal speech can I do a Sal speech okay uh some of you may have heard of uh evolve Club at University of Cape Town right my friend right there Ashley for me it was a realization like I said I came to be Cape Town because I felt like there was no proper strong Community for Security Professionals in Zim South Africa in Africa in general right so as an effort to sort of like counter that we worked towards building a student Community called evolve cyber security club initially it was an idea at my local University uh be in narar but with time

Ashley was was in Zim for a year then he decided you know the country is um definitely not a good idea to study in then he fled to Cape Town and he's now with the University of Cape Town so yeah he established a chapter there uh doing really good work with um with MWR with a lot of other companies um with with grants yeah they've really helped out groom the community and make it what it is today and we're looking at sort of like branching out that same idea to within other student communities so the basic idea is I think I have like a minute left now basic idea is you come together as students you don't need to be

proficient in anything to do with cyber security as such just have a passion because at the end of the day what you need is the ability to organize so if you're interested if you're University student and interested in establishing H where is this going establishing a cyber security Community Within nework your local University reach out and you help you get started the bsides team is here cyber security in general hacks out they can help out they can assist so my closing notes uh be involved with the community we have a lot of those but because this is 15 minutes we can't discuss much uh strive for balance always be a good person within the field but also be able

to strike a balance because at the end of the day it's not the pretty face that gets the work done and yeah share your knowledge I haven't always been the best but for some weird reason I enjoy standing in front of people rambling that's how I get to remember stuff easily so yeah thank you so much for listening this is it [Applause] across the attack surface scattered products and siloed views create blind spots that feel Unstoppable the deadliest risks are in these gaps where attackers move in it's time to unify fragmented snapshots into one allseeing view of risk and unleash a platform born with one intention isolate and eradicate your priority exposures from it infrastructure to Cloud environments to

critical infrastructure and everywhere where in between this is tenable your exposure ends here