BSides

The Basics:

If you cannot make it to the OG BSides conference in Las Vegas, don’t fret, as there is a good chance that there is a BSides being held in a city closer to you. BSides is one of the most popular security “franchises“ that you can attend, and for good reason. Cofounded in 2009, BSides originally began as a conference that followed Black Hat and featured the presentations that didn’t get selected for the more “prestigious” convention hence the name BSides, a reference to the B Side of a Vinyl record that generally contained the less popular songs. These conferences are more community driven events and doesn’t generally have corporate partners that host or sponsor the event.

BSides is a hacker convention that is very much community driven, so if you are looking to get a highly scripted monologue from a polished and impressive C-Suite executive BSides is a conference you should skip. But if you want a haphazard presentation about a very specific passion project from a fellow CyberNerd who has been waiting all year to give this speech then consider checking this out. You can either attend in person or check and see if the BSides conference you are interested in is streaming their speakers, as is often the case with BSides Las Vegas.

Our Review:

We haven’t been to a BSides in person yet, although we hope to send someone to the one in Seattle next summer, but we have watched a couple presentations from speakers at the 2022 Las Vegas BSides event. While not every presentation caught our attention, and don’t be ashamed if you don’t understand all the technical details we didn’t either, this conference has something for every level of CyberNerd.