The contrast between the information security research performed in academia and that performed in the hacker community is often striking. Academic research is often thoroughly cited, based on prior work, but can be theoretical and of marginal practical use. The hacker community can perform awesome, cutting edge research but can totally ignore prior art and proper research procedures without any real penalty. This panel will examine how academic and hacker research really happens. We will try to separate the good from the bad in an effort to make our community more productive and increase the quality of our research.
This is not your ordinary plenary, however - we'll be moving through this discussion in a fun and fast paced fashion. Panel members will be put through their paces as we give them a quiz, test their drawing skills and put their answers to music. There might even be dancing.*
*Ok, maybe no dancing.
Matt Blaze is on the faculty at the University of Pennsylvania, where he directs the Distributed Systems Laboratory and does research on security, cryptography, and systems. He teaches academics to be hackers and hackers to be academics.
Chris Eagle is a Senior Lecturer of Computer Science at the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) in Monterey, CA. A computer engineer/scientist for 27 years, his research interests include computer network operations, computer forensics and reverse/anti-reverse engineering. He has been a speaker at conferences such as Black Hat, CodeCon, Shmoocon, and Defcon and is the author of "The IDA Pro Book". In his spare time he is the Dean of Hacking for the Sk3wl of r00t, past champions of the Defcon CTF, and a core member of DDTEK, the most recent organizers of Defcon CTF.
invisigoth (inˈvizəˌgäTH); or visi noun. 1. Hacker. A student of applied offensive technology who believes in the zen of weapons grade digital artillery. 2. Developer Author of vdb, vtrace, and vivisect, which are used around the world for pwning. oh and debugging and stuff. 3. Kenshoto Member Bat shit crazy member of the hacker group Kenshoto who won, and subsequently designed and implemented DEFCON ctf for a bunch of years.
Dave Marcus currently serves as Director and Chief Architect of Threat Research and Intelligence for McAfee®'s Federal Advanced Programs Group. His focus includes advanced research and threat intelligence projects such as Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) analysis, financial fraud malware, hardware-assisted security architecture and SCADA/ICS research. In his spare time he rides his Harley, is an avid powerlifter, metalhead and family man. He also enjoys practicing the art of lockpicking and is a hacker of things.
Michael Schearer ("theprez98") is the founder of MyFreeState and the Assault on Privacy, projects which document abuses of freedom and liberty. He is a Senior Penetration Tester at Booz Allen and a law student at UDC- DCSL. He spent nearly nine years in the Navy as an EA-6B Prowler ECMO. His military experience includes aerial combat missions over Afghanistan and Iraq and nine months on the ground doing counter-IED with the Army. He is a graduate of Georgetown’s National Security Studies Program and a speaker at ShmooCon, DEFCON, HOPE, and other conferences. Michael lives in Maryland with his wife and children.