- In a packed room at one of the largest hacking conferences in the world, kids are learning how to hack everything from door locks to computer games to hardware
- This year, the US Army — in partnership with the security firm Synack — is teaching these children “white hat,” or ethical hacking skills, says Daniel Lim, first lieutenant of the US Army Cyber Command, who is leading the workshop
- “We’ll be teaching basic exploitation using open source tools and basic command line tools,” Lim said “This is designed for complete beginners”
- The training is similar to what the Army teaches its soldiers at the US Army Cyber School, where Lim was an instructor
- Eventually, some of these kids might one day hack the government – And that’s a good thing
- To bolster our country’s cyber defenses, the Army and other government agencies try to penetrate their own systems through hacking – But the talent pool needs to grow
- It’s expected that there will be a job shortage of almost 2 million cybersecurity professionals by 2022
- This event can help train the next generation of cybersecurity experts who will help keep companies, people, and even the country safe
- More than half of the attendees come to DEF CON just for the r00tz Asylum kids program, asking their parents to spend summer vacation in a packed meeting room in the Caesars Palace hotel.
