Greg Conti
Greg Conti is a hacker, maker, and computer scientist. He is Principal at Kopidion, a cyber security training and professional services firm. Greg is a long-time Defcon, Black Hat, and infosec community speaker and trainer. Formerly he served on the West Point faculty for 16 years where he led their cybersecurity research and education programs, and has published approximately 100 articles and papers covering hacking, online privacy, usable security, cyber conflict, and security visualization. Greg is a graduate of West Point, Johns Hopkins, and Georgia Tech.
Session
Cyberpunk authors, like Neal Stephenson in Snow Crash, have long envisioned a world run by ruthless mega-corporations, with more power than governments, engaging in threat activity. We now live in such a world. Tech companies wield immense, often invisible power, far beyond what they admit to users. We’ve caught glimpses:
• A cloud provider scanning customer data for offensive content
• A rideshare app tracking users after the ride ends
• A robotic vacuum that builds maps of your home
• A respected security company bricking systems across the globe… accidentally
These aren’t theoretical. They’re the tip of the iceberg. The real capabilities, the ones no one talks about, are far more dangerous.
Governments know it. That’s why some ban certain apps and hardware.
Threat actors know it. That’s why they break in.
The question is: do you know what’s really possible?
This talk explores the dark potential of modern tech platforms, the things they’re structurally able to do, whether or not they intend to. We’ll walk through scenarios where companies might be tempted to go offensive, where insiders (or outsiders) could gain and weaponize access, and how these powers could be misused at scale.
Because in security, it’s never about what a system claims to do.
It’s about what it can do.