One of the biggest differences we face from our adversaries is a significant profit motive to breach your environments. But social science work on how criminals organize is lacking, what with criminals being so unwilling to advertise their methods. My theory is that we can instead learn from historian criminal organizations. Pirate companies share a lot in common with cyber-criminals - roaming the seas instead of cyberspace and sailing through significant gaps in international law. And what I've learned is that pirates were impressively organized. These pirate companies, forced to innovate or die (literally), turned into some of the most progressive companies the world had ever seen. There is a lot of learn from this stunning level of innovation. These were the first Nation State level adversaries the American people faced following the revolutionary war. My goal for this talk is to convince you that we can learn a lot about how today's criminals organize and my extension learn what strategies stopped pirates in the past (and which ones didn't). And the very least we should have a healthy respect for professional criminals.

Adam Hogan is a field security engineer for CrowdStrike working with threat intelligence and endpoint protection. He has worked as a SOC analyst, intrusion detection consultant and taught security classes across the US and UK before joining a sales team for the privilege of not having to go into the same office every day. He currently lives in New Albany, Ohio. His graduate studies were in economics, which makes him an expert in ruining diner parties that turn political.

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