Security Gatherings for the Little Guys

NeedaFirewall writes: "With all of the recent vulnerability announcements and increased concern about terrorism, a lot of folks are starting to take security and privacy more seriously, both at the network and node levels. Large companies can afford to send their IT people to detailed technical security conferences offered by the likes of SANS, Blackhat, and others. Some of these cost thousands of dollars for a single seminar, class, or other event. Small companies and individual programmers, network admins, etc (like me!) often can't afford these. Where can they go to learn more about security? Are there quality security conferences, seminars, trade shows, and the like out there that the little guys can afford? Particularly broad-scope gatherings that can teach these 'security newbies' the basics and alert them to the most pertinent threats?"

Comments

Obligatory Karma Whore

[sllort]

Using the free Nessus tool can be very, very valuable towards securing your external IP-addressable presence if you don't have thousands of dollars to blow on security.

Note this will only identify some potential holes in your firewall, and won't secure you against other vectors like email worms, malicious employees, nuclear weapons, hair gel, etc.