Let me get this straight: these people go to Las Vegas, and this is the best thing they can come up with?
Welcome to Def Con, the self-proclaimed “largest underground hacking event in the world.” That’s a tough claim to verify, what with the fetishistic value the attendees and organizers of such gatherings place on privacy, but there is no doubt that Def Con has exploded in popularity in the 12 years since a 21-year-old hacker dubbed The Dark Tangent (a.k.a. Jeff Moss) decided to launch the event as a way to meet a bunch of friends he’d only known online. About a 100 such friends answered his call for that first conference in 1993; at the 2004 Con, every one of the 4,000 preprinted entry badges sold out early. To get one, all you needed to do was show up at the door, $80 cash in hand. No preregistration, no names, no questions asked.
And what do The Dark Tangent’s underground army of friends get for their 80 bucks? They get a three-day program packed with panel presentations on everything from the latest security research to tips on hacking your car. They get a chance to test themselves in a full slate of competitions, including War Driving (a scavenger hunt to identify unprotected wireless-access points in Las Vegas), Wi-Fi Shootout (a contest to establish long-distance wireless connections in the desert) and Spot the Fed (a game that awards T-shirts to those who successfully identify government agents in the crowd)—not to mention the hallowed annual coffee-brewing challenge (these guys are serious about their java).
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