Cатсн²² (in)sесuяitу / ChrisJohnRiley

Back on the 21st August 2007 I was sitting at home in Austria writing my first ever blog post. It wasn’t well thought out (I’m sure most things I write aren’t), but it signified a big turning point that has changed my life in so many different ways.

So many things happened 3 years ago, most of which readers to this blog won’t really be interested in. I quit my job as a SysAdmin in Germany. I moved to Austria. I started to REALLY learn German (finally)…. oh, and I went to India for 6 weeks.

The one thing I really remember from that time though, was getting back into things that I’d long forgotten. I spent a lot of time as a kid programming from books (just copying BASIC code from magazines and playing with it mostly). I also spent a lot of time early on in my career really playing with technology, seeing what it could do and how to make things do other more interesting things. Somewhere along the road though, I lost that drive and started to just accept things as they were. I guess using Microsoft technology for too long will force that realization on you. Wow, how depressing…

So what really turned me around and made me love technology again. I attended my first Hacker con…. and yes, it was a REAL hacker con, and not a security conference. I spent a glorious week in a field near Berlin at the Chaos Computer Camp. It was without a doubt the best thing I’ve ever done. Scary as hell… very little German language skill, no friends in the “community”, and no idea where I was going to sleep even (that was sorted by the every friendly Nick “Hackers on a Plane” Farr however…. and for that I’m forever thankful). Even though I came back thinking negative about everything (I realized how little I really knew), I picked myself back up and started on this journey into security.

A little more than 3 years and 267 blog posts on (3 or 4 of which might actually be categorized as “reasonable”), and I still feel like I don’t know anything… but at least I know why now. There’s just too much for 1 person to learn. Security is just such a big field, that you need to pick and choose your targets. Yeah, I’m still not good at that, as can be seen at how much the blog contents twists and turns between topics depending on my mood and interest at the time. Still, people seem to like it. At least the blog stats for the last few years are encouraging.

It still mystifies me somewhat that people come here to read things I write. I’m not the most experienced writer, and sometimes I look back on things I’ve written and feel an overwhelming urge to just click the “Move to Trash” icon. Still, things can only get better… after all, the way I write, they couldn’t get much worse could they 😀

So what was this post all about? Well, nothing really. I just didn’t want to let another anniversary slip past without telling that story… oh and next year is the return of the Chaos Computer Camp (it runs on a 4 year cycle). Lets hope I come back feeling more positive this time eh 😉

So here’s to another 3 years. Lets hope I can keep up the pace…