1402, 2020

BSidesLondon – Mentors wanted!

René Pfeiffer/ February 14, 2020/ Administrivia, Conference

You may have heard of the BSides London Rookie Track. It’s the track with the 15 minutes presentation slots where people who have never presented at a security conference before can give it a try. Take me word for it, preparing these 15 minutes is hard work. Even if you had your share of presentations you still have to put some thought into the structure, the material, and the way you want to make your point(s). It’s easier for veterans. It’s hell for rookies. Even with a moderately cleaned pile of information the first drafts of your presentation take ages. In addition you probably make all the mistakes we all made before. This is where the mentors come in. Mentors are experts in their field and have presented before. And mentors we want! Why

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1202, 2020

Rookie Track Registration BSidesLondon – don’t miss the deadlines!

René Pfeiffer/ February 12, 2020/ Call for Papers, Conference

BSidesLondon has opened the Rookie Track registration. Submit your project ideas. Get a chance to present at an information security event. Let mentors guide you to the stage. We are pretty sure that you have something to share with us. This won’t be the last reminder. Deadlines are closer than you think, quite similar to objects in the rear view mirror. We enjoyed many Rookie presentations at BSidesLondon, and your content is valuable to the audience. The fact that seats get scarce very quickly is a good indicator that your contribution should be submitted to the Rookie Track registration before the call for presentation closes. The best two rookies will get the opportunity to travel to Vienna in November and attend DeepSec 2020. The first rookie can relax and enjoy our conference. The second

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0502, 2020

DeepSec Support for BSidesLondon Rookie Track 2020

René Pfeiffer/ February 5, 2020/ Administrivia, Conference

We will support the BSidesLondon 2020 Rookie Track again. Talents need our support, and information security research knows no borders and no perimeter (ask the pentesters!). So we would like to keep up the tradition of lending a hand, hopefully beyond 2020. The best rookies will get the chance to attend DeepSec and to hold a presentation there. If you want to be one of the rookies, then head to the Rookie Track CFP 2020. Submit your idea! Present your project! In case you have a lot of experience and want to share this treasure with others, consider becoming a mentor for the rookies. The BSidesLondon Mentor Application 2020 is open. Presenting must be practised. However practice without proper training is quite difficult. This is where the mentors come in. To quote from the

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2405, 2019

Getting ready for BSidesLondon – Support the Rookie Track!

René Pfeiffer/ May 24, 2019/ Security

Deadlines are great. They serve as a great syscall. Everything must be ready and be written to disk. The schedule of BSidesLondon was already stored and forwarded. Have a look! It’s worth it! The titles sound great. We recommend having some IPv6 as a starter (IPv4 is really getting scarce these days). The main dish should have some pieces of cloud platforms, RF hacking, SOCs, and power grid. Emotet, GPUs, and Windows Event Log forensics. Don’t forget to support the rookies by attending their presentations. They put a lot of effort into the preparation, and they have lots of interesting topics ready for you. The 15 minute slots are great to get an in-depth introduction into the topic. In addition the rookies rely on the feedback of everyone of you, especially the exploit-hardened veterans

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0304, 2019

BSidesLondon Rookie Track – Personalities, Stories, Presentations

René Pfeiffer/ April 3, 2019/ Communication, Conference

In past articles we have written about the BSidesLondon Rookie Track. We also spread to call for mentors a while ago. Let’s talk about the people who will present at the Rookie Track and who haven’t spoken at conferences yet. While there exist a lot of helpful advice out there on how to speak, how to prepare, how to structure your presentation, there is one thing that can’t be created from scratch – your personality. It defines a lot of what you will be doing on the stage. It will also be a key component of your talk, so you should spend some time to think about this important factor. Social media, blogs, and discussions sometimes mention the term infosec rock star. This label carries a lot of different meanings. More often than not

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1106, 2016

BSidesLND2016 Rookie Track Review

René Pfeiffer/ June 11, 2016/ Discussion, Security, Stories

Sitting through the Rookie Track at BSidesLondon is something we really enjoy. This year the quality of the presentations was amazing. Of course, the rookie’s mentors take a part of the blame for that. Good training gives you always a head start. Nevertheless someone has to stand in front of the crowd and fill the 15 minutes slot with content. All rookies did a good job. It was hard to pick a clear winner. The jury took more than three iterations to find a conclusion. Locard made it, and we welcome him to DeepSec 2016 in November. Honourable mentions go to @Shlibness, @Oxana_Sereda and @callygarr. For you we have some thoughts on the presentations we saw and on the methods being used. Think of your presentation as code. Make it lean and mean. It’s

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