Living the dream, Apidays, and meeting bug hunters

Still not a technical post today, didn't take the time to work this past week, was pretty busy here in NYC. But a lot to tell about other stuff.

I met great hackers here in NYC and also attended a conference, which was not on the plan, but as I don't plan anything, that was perfect.

Meeting new people

As I previously told you, here is so easy to meet new people and to talk to anybody, even in the street.

Thanks to Link, I met another Bug Hunter who lives here, Tess, who mainly works on BugCrowd and Hackerone.

It's always great to meet people doing what you do all around the world. It can give you new perspective about how you work and what to improve on you workflow. It gave me new perspectives on recon and automation. I need to take time doing it more to expand my attack surface.

I also met Mashoud, who is from here too. Pretty great hanging out with the boys here and discovering the city from the point of view of a local. We did hack a little bit together, and it's so nice to see new points of view about your work.

And it finally convinced me to switch way more on HackerOne and to find great programs there.

Apidays

There was a conference here about APIs and AI. I didn't hear about that, but Tess invited me and got a free ticket to attend it ( pretty nice, looking at the $1000 ticket ).

I thought it would only be about AI and APIs, and it was. But there also was some talks about security as well by Nahamsec and Katie. So it was also nice meeting them and talking with them.

We also did the little CTF. The challenges were pretty basic, but it was nice competing with Nahamsec to see who would be the first to finish all the challenges. I finished 2nd, but that was still very nice. ( Thanks Mashoud for the last fucking username challenge, but let's keep it professional )

I ended up getting a LEGO as a prize. I still don't know how I will take it back with my little bag, but that was fun.

I also met the PortSwigger team and got some great swag from them. We discussed Caido as well, as I mainly use that, but great to see the new features coming to Burp.

Living the dream

By meeting new people here and talking with them about what I'm doing, they were all amazed by that. That this is like a dream life to be able to work from anywhere, travelling, meeting people, and having fun with your job.

And it reminds me why I chose to do it. When working and being focused, I usually forget about all of that, and I'm just doing it. But looking back, that's definitely the life I always wanted to live. Be totally free and do what I want.

I don't want to say that I'm lucky as I worked hard for that, and I always made my choices based on this way of life. But back in 2017, I was looking at a lot of YouTubers doing that, travelling, working, living the life.

And it was hard, it's always and for everything. And some part of that was tough, but it was definitely worth it. And it's not the end, it's still the beginning. Looking at the great people I met here, I still have so much to do, and it's so enjoyable; the journey is great.

I know that some people reading that are like dreaming about doing all of that. I was like that too. So just continue and do the stuff you have to do to achieve that. It takes time and a day, you wake up, and you end up achieving it.

Next week, I will be back in Paris, so glad to come back to finally eat better, healthier food, and attend some great events. But I will definitely come back here, I loved this city.