August 13th 2026: “You Can’t Buy a Security Program” with Robert Garbee

/ roanokeinfosec

Hi everyone,

As August rolls in and Hacker Summer Camp wraps up, we’re continuing the excitement right here at home with ‘Noke’s own hacker summer event!

This month, we are thrilled to welcome a very familiar face to the podium, one of RISE’s own co-founders, Robert Garbee! Whether you’re looking to build a security program from scratch, mature an existing one, or learn how to speak the language of business leadership, this is a session you won’t want to miss.

The Details

  • Speaker: Robert Garbee (Director of Information Security at Carilion Clinic & RISE Co-Founder)
  • Topic: You Can’t Buy a Security Program: A Business-First Roadmap for Building Security from the Ground Up
  • Date: Thursday, August 13th
  • Time: 6:00 PM (Financials update at 5:50 PM)
  • Location: Virginia Western Community College (VWCC)
  • Food: We will be providing free pizza! 🍕 

Important Note: We will be sharing our quarterly financial update starting at 5:50 PM, 10 minutes prior to the main presentation. Be sure to arrive a few minutes early if you’d like to catch the update!

About the Speaker

Robert Garbee is the Director of Information Security at Carilion Clinic, bringing over 25 years of experience across healthcare, education, and defense sectors. A co-founder of both RISE and BSides Roanoke, as well as an adjunct instructor at Virginia Western Community College, Robert is a longtime leader and familiar voice in our regional cybersecurity community.

About the Talk

You Can’t Buy a Security Program: A Business-First Roadmap for Building Security from the Ground Up

Building an effective information security program takes more than purchasing tools and checking compliance boxes. This presentation provides a practical roadmap for starting from scratch, or bringing structure to an immature program, by securing executive sponsorship, understanding the business, assessing the environment against the CIS Critical Security Controls, prioritizing risk, and building sustainable governance, funding, and teams. Attendees will leave with an actionable approach for translating technical concerns into business risk and developing a security program that can mature with the organization.

Whether you’re a practitioner, a leader, a student, or just interested in security strategy, come out and support one of RISE’s founders!

Meeting Details:

We will be meeting at Virginia Western Community College in the Hall Family Business/Science Building. Take the stairs to the left and go to the third floor and go to the CyberSecurity lab in room M302.

Meeting info:

Virginia Western Community College
Business/Science Building, Room M302
August 13th, 2026 @ 6PM
https://maps.app.goo.gl/ToJyoaMJ5BUy417QA

Mark your calendars for August 13th at 6:00 PM (or 5:50 PM for the financials update) at VWCC. We can’t wait to see you there!

July 9th 2026: Summer Heat and Hacking Echoes

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We hope you’re surviving the July heat! Whether you’ve been spending your summer flipping hotdogs on the grill or flipping bits in the terminal, we’ve got the perfect excuse for you to escape the humidity and step into some glorious air conditioning.

We are keeping the summer sizzle going this month with an incredible speaker and a topic focused on taking back your privacy and liberating your own hardware.

The Details

  • Speaker: Mark Carman
  • Topic: Removing Alexa: Hacking Amazon Echo devices for Local Voice Control
  • Date: Thursday, July 9th
  • Time: 6:00 PM
  • Location: Virginia Western Community College, Business/Science Building, Room M302 (see details below)
  • The Perks: We are providing pizza! 🍕

About the Talk

Amazon makes some really good smart devices, but they come with the privacy issue of handing all of your personal information and more directly to a mega corporation. Instead of succumbing to the corporate surveillance state, lets take ownership of our hardware and keep our data to ourselves.

Mark will show which Amazon Echo devices are hackable, how the hack works, perform a live hack to show how easy it is, and turn echo devices into a fully locally controlled voice assistant that can control your home without an internet connection!

Whether you are a privacy advocate, an IoT hobbyist, or just want to watch some great live hacking, this is a demonstration you won’t want to miss.

Where

We will be meeting at Virginia Western Community College in the Hall Family Business/Science Building. Take the stairs to the left and go to the third floor and go to the CyberSecurity lab in room M302.

Mark your calendars, bring a friend, and we look forward to seeing you all back at Virginia Western on July 9th!

June 11 Social @ Starr Hill + BSides Roanoke Recap!

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BSides Roanoke 2026 is officially in the books, and what an absolute blast it was!

Thank you so much to everyone who spoke, volunteered, sponsored, or just came out to hang and learn. You are the reason this community is so special, and you made the return of BSides unforgettable.

Now that the stage is packed up and the summer weather is officially heating up, it is time to wind down. Let’s celebrate with some frosty beverages.

Join us this Thursday, June 11th at 6:00 PM for a casual post-BSides social at Starr Hill. There’s no agenda and no presentations; just a great chance to hang out, swap stories, and catch up with the local infosec scene.

🍻 The Essentials

  • Date: Thursday, June 11th
  • Time: 6:00 PM
  • Location: Starr Hill Pilot Brewery & Side Stage (Roanoke, VA)
  • Vibe: 100% Social. Cold drinks, warm weather, and post-con chat.

See you on the patio at Starr Hill!

May 2026 – May 14 Social @ Starr Hill + BSides Roanoke 2026 Next Month!

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The organizers have been hard at work behind the scenes getting BSides Roanoke 2026 ready for its big return after our non-profit hiatus. We are incredibly excited, a little exhausted, and honestly? We’re ready for a frosty beverage with the community.

Join us on May 14th at 6:00 PM for a casual social at Starr Hill Pilot Brewery & Side Stage. There’s no agenda and no formal presentations; just a great opportunity for the local infosec scene to hang out, swap stories, and catch up on everything we’ve been building for 2026.

📅 The Essentials

📢 BSides Roanoke 2026: Important Update

  • Last Call for Guaranteed Shirts: This is the final week to purchase a ticket and be guaranteed a conference shirt in your specific size. Don’t miss out on the official “Return of BSides” threads; head over to the site and grab your ticket now to make sure we have one waiting for you!
  • Tickets & Info: bsidesroa.org

We’ve missed this event during our “re-org” year and can’t wait to see everyone in person again. See you at Starr Hill!

P.S. Want a secret sneak peek? If you poke around bsidesroa.org right now, you might just find some of the upcoming talks starting to show up. Don’t tell anyone we told you…

April 2026: Kernel Hacking with AI 🤖, Financial Update, & BSides Roanoke

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As the spring rains settle over the Roanoke Valley, there is something about the atmosphere of a rainy April evening that pairs perfectly with a deep-dive technical session behind the glow of a screen. We’re heading back into the lab this month to take shelter from the showers and focus on the latest in kernel security.

Here is a look at what’s happening this month:

  • April 9 @ 5:45 PM: Pre-meeting RISE Financial Update (Non-Profit status).
  • April 9 @ 6:00 PM: Main Meeting: Tyler “dru1d” Booth presents “Make No Mistake: Kernel Hacking with AI.”
  • June 5: BSides Roanoke 2026 – Tickets are moving fast.
  • Final Call: The BSides CFP is reaching its deadline—submit your proposals now.

Special Announcement: RISE Financials

Time: 5:45 PM (15 minutes before the main event)

Now that RISE is officially a non-profit, we want to be transparent with the community that keeps us running. We will be presenting the RISE financials briefly before our guest speaker begins.

Arrive early to dodge the showers and see how we’re bootstrapping the future of RISE.

RISE Meeting: Make No Mistake: Kernel Hacking with AI

Time: 6:00 PM

This month, we are excited to welcome Tyler “dru1d” Booth, who will show us how modern AI can be used to navigate the complex world of kernel driver reverse engineering.

About the Talk

Kernel driver reverse engineering has always been a slow, painful grind. Weeks of decompilation, IOCTL tracing, and hunting for known exploit primitives. But what if you could compress months of work into days with AI models doing the heavy lifting?

Tyler will walk through building an AI-assisted kernel exploitation workflow, from purpose-built agent pipelines to the pragmatic reality of manually steering Claude through driver triage and weaponization.

In this session, we’ll cover:

  • HEXXUS: A platform of specialized AI agents (triager, exploit dev, crash handler, orchestrator) backed by custom MCP servers for WinDbg, Hyper-V, and Binary Ninja. What happens when you try to fully automate driver exploitation, and how much it can run up your API bill.
  • CASE STUDY: INFOHAZARD BOF: Four days from VirusTotal target identification to a fully weaponized Beacon Object File: kernel virtual memory read/write, token manipulation, credential dumping, process integrity modification, and kernel callback enumeration/removal. The kind of project that used to take a month or two.
  • What We Learned: Where AI actually helped, where it hallucinated, and why you still need to double-check your agents’ work.

Meeting Details:

Whether you are a seasoned professional or just getting started in the field, we invite you to join us at Virginia Western Community College in the Hall Family Business/Science Building. We’ll be meeting on the third floor in the CyberSecurity lab, Room M302.

Meeting Info:

  • Location: VWCC Business/Science Building, Room M302
  • Date: April 9th, 2025
  • Financials Start: 5:45 PM
  • Main Presentation: 6:00 PM
  • View Map

Tickets: BSides Roanoke 2026

Don’t wait until the last minute. General admission tickets for BSides Roanoke 2026 (June 5th) are available. Join us for a full day of technical talks and workshops right here in Roanoke.

Purchase Tickets: https://www.zeffy.com/en-US/ticketing/bsides-roanoke–2026

Final Call: BSides Roanoke 2026 CFP

The window is closing fast. If you have a breakthrough, a unique case study, or a tool you’ve been building, we want to see it on the big stage this June. If you submit after April 5th, it might be too late.

Submit here: https://forms.gle/XXXgp2fysP91v4oR9

We look forward to seeing you all on April 9th for RISE and June 5th for BSides Roanoke!

March 2026 – NTLM Relaying – Tricks of the Trade, BSides Tickets Now Available, & More!

/ roanokeinfosec

Between our immediate sessions this March and the countdown to our big event in June, there is a lot happening in the local security community. Here is a quick look at what’s inside this update:

  • March 12: RISE Meeting at VWCC: Logan Diomedi presents “NTLM Relaying – Tricks of the Trade.”
  • March 31: RBTC IT Security Forum CTF (Jeopardy-style).
  • June 5: BSides Roanoke 2026 – Tickets are officially on sale!
  • Last Call: The BSides CFP is closing soon for the June 5th main event.

RISE Meeting: NTLM Relaying – Tricks of the Trade

We are excited to welcome Logan Diomedi, who will be delivering a deep-dive session on the current state of the art in NTLM Relaying. This session serves as a comprehensive primer for those looking to master the “Tricks of the Trade” and rise from simple relaying to total domain royalty.

Whether you are an offensive practitioner or a defender, Logan will walk you through the essential tactics employed in modern environments. The talk will cover existing tooling, basic and advanced tactics, and the specific primitives required to navigate, and eventually rule, the complex attack surfaces of Active Directory.

The session will demonstrate how existing tools and basic tactics can be leveraged to seize control of a network environment.

Meeting Details:

We will be meeting at Virginia Western Community College in the Hall Family Business/Science Building. Take the stairs to the left and go to the third floor and go to the CyberSecurity lab in room M302.

Meeting Info:

Virginia Western Community College
Business/Science Building, Room M302
March 12th, 2025 @ 6PM
View Map

🎟️ Tickets Now Available: BSides Roanoke 2026

General admission tickets for BSides Roanoke 2026 are now officially available! Join us on June 5th, 2026, at Virginia Western Community College for a day of technical talks, workshops, and community networking.

📢 Last Call: BSides Roanoke 2026 CFP

It’s time to get those proposals in! This is your last call to submit for the CFP. If you have a talk, a workshop, or a cool project you’ve been working on, we want to hear from you.

Upcoming Event: RBTC IT Security Forum CTF

Also, don’t miss the RBTC IT Security Forum: Hands on Security CTF on March 31.

Whether you’re a seasoned “gray-beard” IT pro or a “green” security n00b, this Jeopardy-style CTF is the premier professional cybersecurity event in the ROA/NRV area. Created by the RBTC IT Security Forum and run by the Virginia Cyber Range, it’s a great opportunity to connect and compete with the regional community.

We look forward to seeing you at these events!

February 2026 – Social + BSides Roanoke CFP Reminder!

/ roanokeinfosec

We’re officially through the post-holiday slump, and it’s time to discuss the new year together. Let’s shake off the February chill with some good company and even better conversation!

Join your fellow cybersecurity pros for our February social; it’s the perfect chance to decompress, talk shop, and enjoy a cold beverage at one of our favorite local spots.

The Details

  • When: Thursday, February 12th @ 6:00 PM
  • Where: Twisted Track Brewpub (523 Shenandoah Ave NW)
  • Vibe: Informal. No slides, no long-winded agendas; just peers swapping tales and learnings.

CFP Reminder: BSides Roanoke 2026

The clock is ticking! This is your friendly reminder that the Call for Presentations (CFP) for BSides Roanoke is winding down. We want your technical deep dives, your “I can’t believe I found this” stories, and your unique security perspectives.

Keep an eye on our shiny new website, https://bsidesroa.org, for all the latest updates as we get closer to June.

We look forward to seeing you tomorrow night!

January 15th: Building a SIEM & BSides Roanoke CFP!

/ roanokeinfosec

Happy New Year! We hope you had a fantastic holiday season.

We are kicking off 2026 with an incredible speaker and a topic that hits home for every security enthusiast: building your own security visibility from the ground up.

The Details

  • Speaker: Lizz Boice, Head of Cybersecurity Operations at GFiber
  • Topic: More Logs Please! Building a SIEM in Your Homelab
  • Date: Thursday, January 15th
  • Location: Virginia Western Community College (VWCC)

A Note on the Date: RISE typically meets on the second Thursday of the month. The first Thursday fell on New Year’s Day, we shifted our planning cycle back one week. We are meeting on the third Thursday (Jan 15th) for this month only to adjust for a post holiday recovery!

About the Talk

The best way to understand the tools of the trade is often to build them yourself. Whether you are looking to sharpen your detection engineering skills or just want to know what your home network is actually doing, there is no better teacher than a well-built homelab.

Lizz Boice will walk us through the journey of deploying a production-grade security stack right in your own home. Drawing on her experience in detection and automation at organizations like Zoox and Palo Alto Networks, Lizz will strip away the enterprise buzzwords to give you a clear, practical guide to log collection.

In this hands-on session, we’ll cover:

  • The “Why”: How SIEM helps Blue Teamers correlate logs and Red Teamers understand forensics.
  • The Build: A step-by-step guide to deploying the Elastic Stack (Elasticsearch, Kibana, and Fleet) using Docker.
  • The Hurdles: Fixing real-world headaches like SSL certificates and “503 Service Unavailable” errors.
  • The Data: How to collect and search through data from your devices using Elastic agents.

Whether you are an aspiring SOC analyst, a seasoned Red Teamer, or a hobbyist who loves data, this talk will give you the blueprint to turn server logs into powerful security intelligence.

Meeting Details:
We will be meeting at Virginia Western Community College in the Hall Family Business/Science Building. Take the stairs to the left and go to the third floor and go to the CyberSecurity lab in room M302.​

Meeting info:
Virginia Western Community College
Business/Science Building, Room M302
January 15th, 2025 @ 6PM
https://maps.app.goo.gl/ToJyoaMJ5BUy417QA

Call for Presentations: BSides Roanoke 2026

It’s never too early to start planning for June! BSides Roanoke 2026 is happening on June 5th, 2026, and the CFP is officially open.

If you have a talk, a workshop, or a cool project you’ve been working on, we want to hear from you.

Submit your proposal here:https://forms.gle/XXXgp2fysP91v4oR9

We look forward to seeing you all at Virginia Western on the 15th!

December 2026: December Social & BSides Roanoke CFP Open!

/ roanokeinfosec

As the year winds down, let’s take a moment to celebrate before the holidays officially take over! Join your fellow cybersecurity pros for our December social, it’s the perfect chance to decompress, share what you’ve learned this year, and enjoy a cold beverage.

Join us this Thursday, December 11th at 6:00 PM at Twisted Track Brewpub.

This is an informal gathering, meaning no agenda, just a great opportunity to connect with peers and swap tales from the front lines of information security.

🗣️ Call for Presentations (CFP) is OPEN for BSides Roanoke 2026!

Ready to share your knowledge? The Call for Presentations for BSides Roanoke 2026 is officially OPEN!

We’re looking for great technical sessions, deep dives, and unique perspectives for the conference on Friday, June 5th, 2026. If you have an idea, we want to hear it!

Don’t miss the chance to be a part of the local infosec community’s premier event. Be sure to stay tuned to our shiny new website, https://bsidesroa.org, for all conference updates!

📅 December Social Details

We look forward to seeing you there!

Agent-Augmented Security Development and Operations – November 2025

/ roanokeinfosec

As the days grow shorter and we start pulling out our warmest sweaters, it’s the perfect time to turn our focus inward and sharpen our technical skills. Before the frantic holiday season truly kicks in, let’s gather for a session that brings practical, powerful light to the often-dark and complex world of Large Language Models (LLMs) and security.

The lack of sunshine shouldn’t mean a lack of new knowledge! This Thursday, November 13th, Aaron McPhall will be illuminating how we can move past simple chatbot interfaces and start implementing powerful, secure AI agents directly into our workflows.

Feature Talk: Agent-Augmented SecOps: Building Your Private LLM Coding Workbench

The rise of large language models (LLMs) is fundamentally changing the software development and security operations (SecOps) lifecycle.

This session moves beyond basic chatbot coding to explore agentic coding: integrating powerful AI models directly into the IDE to automate complex workflows while maintaining data security.

Why Go Private? Secure AI, Lower Cost

We will focus specifically on utilizing local, open-weight LLMs (like Qwen3 Coder) as cost-effective and private alternatives to expensive cloud services, ensuring sensitive data remains on-premise. Attendees will learn how to build a practical development stack.

Key components that will be covered include:

  • Inference Providers: Selecting an appropriate inference provider (ollama, llama.cpp).
  • Model Mechanics: Understanding the trade-offs in model quantization and context length.
  • Hardware Planning: Calculating the necessary hardware and VRAM to run agents efficiently.
  • Live Orchestration: Through live demonstrations using IDE extensions like RooCode, the presenter will show how to orchestrate complex security tasks such as certificate lifecycle review and structured analysis of helpdesk tickets to unlock the true potential of AI agents in a developer or analyst’s workflow.

If you’ve been looking for a way to leverage AI agents without sacrificing data privacy or blowing your budget, this is a must-attend session. Don’t let the technical complexity of local LLMs keep you in the dark, come learn how to build your own secured workbench.

Meeting Details:

We will be meeting at Virginia Western Community College in the Hall Family Business/Science Building. Take the stairs to the left and go to the third floor and go to the CyberSecurity lab in room M302.

Meeting info:
Virginia Western Community College
Business/Science Building, Room M302
November 13th, 2025 @ 6PM
https://maps.app.goo.gl/ToJyoaMJ5BUy417QA

Looking forward to seeing you there!