x33fcon: In nation-state actor’s shoes

x33fcon is a cybersecurity conference that I had the opportunity to attend a couple of times the previous years. This year I decided to submit a topic, and eventually it was accepted. This meant that in 2021 I also had the honour to present at x33fcon. My talk was titled “In nation-state actor’s shoes” and its goal was to give a different perspective, mainly to blue teamers, about nation-state actors.

So, I regularly use the following quote when talking about security:

If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles

Sun Tzu, The Art of War

I like it because it summarizes perfectly the challenge any security organization faces. No matter how well you know your environment, and how well you think you’re protecting it, unless you know equally well your adversaries you’ll fail. So, my talk was about this. What can we learn about nation-state actors by studying leaked material, and how can we use this to protect our organizations more effectively.

I really enjoyed researching this subject and making this talk possible since it combined multiple areas that I regularly find myself involved with. Espionage history, threat research, cryptology, security engineering, training people, etc. If you want to watch it, the x33fcon team has published it (along with all the other talks, check them out too!) in the conference’s channel on YouTube.

On a final note, I’d like to thank the amazing x33fcon team for making this event possible in this flawless manner, and for giving me the opportunity to present this research to that audience. Also, I have done a few virtual conference talks the past couple of years but this was the first time that in the speaker package there was a framed certificate of appreciation together with a beautiful hoodie. Thanks a lot x33fcon team and hope to see you again next year!