Every August, the cybersecurity community packs up and heads to Las Vegas for what we lovingly call Hacker Summer Camp. It's not one conference. It's a stretch of back-to-back events that includes Black Hat USA (August 1-6 at Mandalay Bay), BSides Las Vegas (August 3-5 at Tuscany Suites), DEF CON 34 (August 6-9 at the Las Vegas Convention Center), and a whole ecosystem of villages, parties, meetups, and hallway conversations in between.
If this is your first year, congratulations! You're about to spend a week surrounded by tens of thousands of people who get it. This post isn't a comprehensive survival guide. There are plenty of those out there. This is the short list of things I tell every first-timer, especially my students, before they get on the plane.
Download Hacker Tracker before you land
If you only take one thing from this post, make it this. Hacker Tracker is a free, open source app built by the community that pulls the schedules for DEF CON, BSides events, and more into one place. Talks, workshops, villages, contests, and even the parties happening around town all live in the app.
Grab it here:
iPhone: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/hackertracker/id1021141595
Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.shortstack.hackertracker
The real power move is favoriting. Before the week starts, scroll through and star anything that looks interesting. Don't commit to anything, just star it. Then when you find yourself randomly free at 2pm on Thursday, open the app and see what's starred near you. That's how the app is meant to be used, and it pairs perfectly with my next point.
Don't build a schedule. Build a direction.
At most conferences, the playbook is to stack your calendar with six back-to-back talks and sprint between rooms all day. Resist that urge here.
I genuinely believe the vast majority of the value at Hacker Summer Camp comes from the organic conversations you'll have with all sorts of people, and from following your own curiosity wherever it leads. The talks are great, and most of the big ones get recorded and posted later. The conversation you strike up in the lockpick village with someone who's been doing incident response for 20 years? That doesn't get recorded. That only happens if you leave room for it.
So instead of a rigid schedule, set a direction for each day. When students ask me how to plan their first DEF CON, my advice is always the same: think "the goal for today is to go by the Red Team Village," not "I have talks at 9, 10, 11, 1, 2, and 4." Pick one or two anchors per day, leave the rest open, and let your starred list in Hacker Tracker fill the gaps.
Give BSides a real look
BSides Las Vegas tends to fly under the radar for first-timers because it's the smallest of the three, and that's exactly why you should consider it. It's community-run, capped in size, and heavy on practitioner-focused content. The talks skew toward things you can actually take back and use, and the smaller crowd makes it far easier to talk with speakers and attendees.
If big conference crowds aren't your thing, a day at BSides might end up being your favorite day of the week. If you haven't heard, this is significantly cheaper than the other conferences too. You can find more information at bsideslv.org.
Take care of the human running the badge
Vegas in August is brutal. It's 105 degrees outside, the casinos are freezing inside, and "it's just down the Strip" means a 25 minute walk. You will put in miles every single day. Comfortable shoes are not optional, and neither is water.
Veterans call it the 3-2-1 rule: a minimum of 3 hours of sleep, 2 meals, and 1 shower every day. It's a joke, but only barely.
The week is a marathon, and burning yourself out on day one means missing the best parts of days three and four. Eat real food, drink more water than you think you need, and don't feel guilty about going back to your room to recharge. The con will still be there when you get back.
Come say hi
Huntress will be at Black Hat at booth #1845 in the Business Hall at Mandalay Bay, running booth sessions Tuesday through Thursday (August 4-6) from our threat researchers, product folks, and practitioners. The full session schedule lives at huntress.com/blackhat2026, and you can book time to sit down with one of our Cybersecurity Advisors there too. You don't need to be a Huntress partner for any of this. If you've never heard of Huntress, come by anyway. Come talk shop, grab some swag, and tell us what you're seeing out there.
If you spot someone in a Huntress shirt anywhere during the week, at BSides, at DEF CON, or in a taco line at 1am, say hello. That's what this week is for.
See you in the desert.
