By Jon Matonis
Bitcoin Foundation
Friday, January 12, 2013
https://bitcoinfoundation.org/presenting-bitcoin-at-infosec-and-hacker-conferences/
I remember going to some of the first RSA conferences at The Fairmont
where I enjoyed celebrity entertainment while feasting on lavish
gourmet food spreads that included six-foot wide bowls of jumbo shrimp
and massive ice sculptures.
The security conference circuit is an
interesting lifestyle, but I also believe that it's vitally important
for bitcoin's expansion to engage these professionals. Some conference
attendees are simply there on their own but many are there because their
employers have sent them to learn something new. As far as speakers go,
you have the keynote regulars, the product hawkers, and the sector
specialists. I tend to shy away from the product hawkers because they
have most likely paid for a sponsorship in exchange for the speaking
slot. Sector specialists are generally worthwhile and they can be senior
employees of their companies or independent consultants with some
government employees thrown in for good measure.
I always relish the opportunity to introduce bitcoin to a new
vertical industry audience as bitcoin cuts through so many traditional
boundaries. Usually, they have heard about bitcoin in a vague way but
they aren't yet clear on why it's so significant. My goal is first to
make bitcoin relevant to their industry then to outline the likely key
impacts that bitcoin will have on their industry. I am not a cheerleader
and I dislike the cultish phrase "fan of Bitcoin" or "fellow Bitcoiner." I wouldn't
necessarily say that others are a "fan of the US dollar" except maybe
Ben Bernanke.
In my opinion, bitcoin is not about convincing other
bitcoin users of its economic merit. Bitcoin is about laying the
foundation for a new society -- a society organized around a
decentralized digital currency that rewards productivity and punishes
the wealth re-distributors. During 2012, I had the privilege of presenting bitcoin at two extraordinary security conferences:
ITWeb Security Summit 2012, May 15-16th, 2012, Johannesburg, South Africa
DeepSec IDSC 2012, November 27-30th, 2012, Vienna, Austria
There
are always excellent audience questions and continued dialogue on
bitcoin's possibilities especially for banking and financial privacy. In
casual hallway conversations with conference attendees, I never know
for sure if I'm talking with a white hat or a black hat.
Also, it can be a very hazy line with a lot of crossover. It doesn't
really matter though, because the best way to prevent security breaches
is to have a solid understanding of the advanced tactics deployed
against the targets. Penetration testers are the gray hats.
If I can reach out to a technical audience already versed in
security
threat models, cryptographic applications, and privacy protocols, I can
likely
advance the movement into the class of the infrastructure builders. You
would be surprised at how many white hat and black hat hackers still
believe in the correctness and stability of national fiat currencies
managed by central bankers. Even though bitcoin fits into the hacker
culture as money with a sound basis in mathematics, they are skeptical
of something so new that has grown so rapidly. Even the high-profile
hacks at some bitcoin exchanges and false claims of 'Ponzi' have
dissuaded intelligent hackers. Just check out some of the uninformed
comments at Slashdot.
However, this is precisely the point. We all know that the
high-profile bitcoin hacks resulted from poor policy planning, wallet
mismanagement, and inadequate backgrounds in network security. If the
hack wasn't outright theft by the principal, it was due to network
security inexperience and a severe lack of funding to procure it. Where
do the leading security professionals for financial institutions
frequent? What is their watering hole? Well, it is the many information
security and hacker conferences around the world like RSA, InfoSec
World, BlackHat, and Defcon. Bringing it to the people -- that's how to
prepare for the transition.
I was told confidentially by an IT Security specialist from a major
bank that the public would be shocked if they knew the amounts that are
stolen daily from online financial institutions via ACH and wire fraud.
Typically, breaches and total numbers are not revealed because they
don't want to advertise a weakness and they certainly don't want to
alarm customers. Some of the more vicious attacks are State sponsored. I
believe him. That's what bitcoin is up against as it progresses into
the mainstream. The leading security experts are in that world, already
protecting against the barbarians at the gate. They are not in the bitcoin world.
I'm looking forward to engaging new audiences and great conference
opportunities are on the horizon for 2013. By promoting and embracing an
anti-Statist currency that obliterates political corruption and the
financial elites, I go to sleep every night knowing that I sit on the
right side of history.
In the meantime, I'll be speaking at a non-hacker payments system summit in March:
Online Virtual Currencies: Cash Becoming Truly Digital
Sunday, January 13, 2013
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