Ballarat Cybersecurity Meetup
Welcome to the CSides Ballarat (aka Cybersecurity Meetup), we are providing a series of beginner-friendly talks to build the local cybersecurity community. Our talks are designed to be accessible to anyone, no matter their background or experience. Join us to learn that cybersecurity can be interesting and deeply engaging. Our next meetup will be held at the Ballarat Hackerspace, 6:00 pm on Friday the 12th of September 2025 (details below), and supper will be provided courtesy of AISA.
| Speaker(s) | Organisation | Topic |
|---|---|---|
| Kenneth Yu | Cyberknowledge | Beneath the Surface - Exploring the Dark Web and it's cybersecurity implications |
| Paul Bongiorno | Independant Cyber Consultant | Gold is Where You Find It |
| Simon McAloon | Vitrafy | The Quantum Time Bomb in Cybersecurity |
No tickets needed.
Location
Friday 12th of September 2025, 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm Ballarat Hacker Space 136a Albert Street, Ballarat Central |  |
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Supporters
The Ballarat Cybersecurity Meetup gratefully acknowledges the following supporters:
AISA: The Australian Information Security Organisation is kindly sponsoring the supper at our meetups.
Eurekative: create innovative prototypes that help businesses launch their projects quickly and efficiently. Their services include designing and developing bespoke software and hardware solutions tailored the client's specific needs. We offer a fast, reliable and cost-effective way to get businesses off the ground https://eurekative.com.au/
Internet Commerce Security Lab: The ICSL at Federation University has been a strong proponent of cybersecurity in the Ballarat region since 2008, resulting in the successful completion of many cybersecurity Masters and PhD students.
Previous Meetups
| Date | Speaker1 | Speaker 2 | Speaker 3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18/07/2025 | Slavo Greminger How to Dissect an Octopus | Gagan Singh - MONSEC Federation Cybersecurity Club | Paul Black - ICSL How To Unpack Malware |
| 13/09/2025 | Paul Black The World's Worst Software Accident | Martijn van Praag Exploring Ghidra - First Steps in Reverse Engineering | Anya Avinash Security Risk and Asset Management |
| 15/11/2024 | Daniel Plohmann An Introduction to Malpedia | Pooja Mishra My Masters by Research Experience | Craig Wilson An Introduction to Theat Modelling |
| 12/07/2024 | Merill Fernando: Using Policy as Code to Secure your Microsoft Tenant with Maester | Sean Park: Heading Towards Pure AI Reverse Engineer | Tarek Chaalan: Adversarial Attacks in Modern Machine Learning |
| 24/05/2024 | Frank Schiliro: Cybercrime - Taxonomy and Behaviors | Sabih Saeed: Autonomous Cyber Operations | Matt Murrell: Personal and Professional Development in Cybersecurity |
| 22/03/.2024 | Jonathon Oliver: Pragmatic Approaches to Clustering Malware | Paul Black: An Introduction to Software Exploitation | |
| 13/10/2023 | Nang Tip, Ryan Jukes An Introduction to AISA | Simon McAloon - Vitrafy Cybersecurity at a Biotech Startup | Tim Haintz - Prompt Engineering Open AI/Chat GPT and Semantic Kernel for Cybersecurity |
| 11/08/2023 | Erica Muir: IBM Fraud Prevention For Small Business | ||
| 09/06/2023 | James Anderson: Google - An Introduction to Red Teaming | Matt Tett: Enex Testlab - Global Cybersecurity Lessons Learned from OT/IoT risks | Ian Firns: Eurekative - Ancedotes of an Eclectic Cybersecurity Career From ADF to the private sector. |
| 14/04/2023 | Kumar Soorya, Fortian - An Introduction to Cybersecurity | Paul Black, ICSL - Getting Started in Reverse Engineering | Tim Haintz: Microsoft - From Helpdesk to Cybersecurity |
