The Golden Age of Hackers in Vegas Is Over
Full article272 words · extracted from 404media.co · click to collapse
💻
This article and trip to DEF CON was only possible thanks to our paying subscribers. Their support covered the flights and ground transportation. Please consider subscribing below to help us do more work like this.
Walking through the hallways of Las Vegas casinos, sitting in the city’s taxis, and speaking to the staff of various businesses, there was a distinct feeling throughout this year’s DEF CON hacking conference: paranoia.
Resorts World, one of the hotels housing a chunk of this year’s hackers, searched rooms daily looking for specific “hacking tools.” Drivers of the Vegas Loop, which ferried attendees to and from the Las Vegas Convention Center, were told by their employer to not bring their personal devices to work in case they got hacked. And casinos kicking DEF CON out after years of hosting the conference sent a clear message: we don’t want you here anymore.
I have covered hacking for ten years and attended the DEF CON and Black Hat security conferences many times; not as many as some veterans I spoke to who have gone to eighteen or even twenty DEF CONs, but enough to feel a definite shift this year. Hackers were no longer seen as a novelty coming into town. They were seen as a threat to peoples’ peace and livelihoods.
This post is for paid members only
Become a paid member for unlimited ad-free access to articles, bonus podcast content, and more.
Sign up for free access to this post
Free members get access to posts like this one along with an email round-up of our week's stories.
Already have an account? Sign in
Text extracted automatically; images, tables and formatting may be missing. Original: https://www.404media.co/the-golden-age-of-hackers-in-vegas-is-over-defcon/