RSA Live!

by Steve Ragan - Apr 7 2008, 05:10

This year, The Tech Herald, in its first major outing since launching the site, will bring you daily coverage live from RSA in San Francisco, CA.

Some of the topics that are scheduled to be covered this year include Linux vs. Windows security, Hacking for the Laymen and Google’s approach to security, plus more. Al Gore is set to speak this year, talking about green technology; however the press is blocked from viewing the keynote address.

Why would Al Gore block the press? One would assume that he would want coverage and attention paid to green technology, but according to announcements made shortly before the conference, the press is barred from attending.

It is now 12AM Eastern, and I am writing this post from my hotel room. One of the themes at RSA this year is personal security. This is a broad area with vendors demonstrating or hyping products and services designed to protect IT infrastructure or offer personal encryption for the typical user.

I mention this fact because, as I went from terminal to terminal making connecting flights, I realize that Johnny Long was right; this place is a social engineer's dream. Waiting in line to be screened for security, I could have taken photos of several IDs, as well as pass badges for pilots and other flight staff.

One of the people I will meet this week is a person who founded a company that focuses on teaching companies, and their employees, the art of defeating social engineering tricks. It’s honestly scary to think that someone with malicious intent could simply book a cheep flight and wait for the last second rush to refill their ID quotient.

For the record, I was not brave enough to take pictures for proof. If you want to see an example of what I see, Google Johnny Long and No Tech Hacking, there is an interesting video from his talk at Def Con.

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