Day Two was more about DC than it was Shmoocon. We managed to hit up some of the presentations while also making sure to visit with the various vendors and talk with some real security gurus at the same time.

Unlike the first day, this was more about one presentation for me than any of the others.

G. Mark Hardy presents A Hacker Looks at 50: This was my personal favorite for the weekend, not only because he grew up in Western New York (where I am from), but because he is a hacker in the purest sense of the word.

He talked about figuring out the admin username and password for the mainframe at his school and successfully taking “rooting” (in modern dialogue) the entire Western NY school network. It was very cool to see the connection between what we see today, and what people saw back then when they were the age we are now. There is a lot to be learned from those with experience and wisdom in the field, as not everything is about the executable, perl script, or batch file that you run.

I spoke at length with some of the vendors, one being AirTight Networks. Their enterprise wireless network management solution was quite interesting, as it allows an organization to control which wireless access points their customers (or users) are able to connect to, being able to prevent them from connecting to rogue access points or any that they are not authorized to be on. It’s highly configurable.

One reason I mention their product is the fact that the Navy Exchange is in talks with them right now to license and use their technology, according to their Sales Rep, that is. With a few DoD entities already leading the way with secured wireless networks, the Navy ought not to be that far behind, as we traditionally never are with new technologies. The cost savings of going completely wireless can be enough to warrant serious consideration.

Later..

I ended up skipping the hack or halo event for the Shmoocon sponsored party at Adams Mills, which was quite the party. There had to be at a couple of hundred geeks just completely owning this place. I made some good friends out of the deal, and then turned in for the night.