RSA Conference: HBGary boss notably absent from RSA after Anonymous hack

February 16, 2011- Greg Hoglund, founder of HBGary, was due on a panel discussion on cyberwar this morning but, as the moderator put it, he's having some problems with Anonymous. The HBGary stand has also been taken down, after a sign was left on there purporting to be from the hacking group.

The reason for this was that the company had received threats of physical violence to its staff. It's possible, according to RSA's former boss Art Coviello. He said that the organisers have been physically threatened in the past for having convicted felon Frank Abagnale (of 'Catch me if you can' fame) give a keynote.

“We are nothing if not passionate,” Coviello said.

However, the conference is usually placid. I suspect Hoglund's non-appearance is more down to embarrassment. Billing yourself as a security expert and then having your servers stripped and shown to the world within 24 hours is a little hard to handle, and would make attending the biggest security conference an uncomfortable experience.

Based on discussions on the show floor he might as well have come. A lot of people are saying privately 'There but for the grace of God go I'. There's nothing you can do to completely lock down a system, although HBGary did show a repetition of easy passwords that is very poor security practice.

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