Hossam Mohamed - Young Hacker to "Not A Security Researcher"

A 19-year-old "not a security researcher" facing limitations because of his age and not having the right "prerequisites," Hossam has had to pave his own path. He also dreams in code and is one of the youngest OSCEs in the world!

BIO

Hossam Mohamed is one of the youngest OSCE in the world and currently working in the cybersecurity domain for a financial company in Istanbul. His area of interest includes exploit development, offensive security, secure web development, and malware analysis. He is a big Python lover.

Notes

On the organizing team of BSides Istanbul
His best friend is a computer
Just finished high school last year!
Was doing freelance web design and security projects for clients
Taught himself assembly
Developing offensive security labs
Hacked his way to getting a job :)

Quotes:

"Because I love [to] code."
"I wanted to understand how these games work." [5:56]
"I developed a project for my school. They liked it, but no one cared actually."
"No one in infosec doesn't play a little bit (hacking)." [8:04]
"Technical interview was great... didn't work because of my age and my education. I was only 18." [10:22]
"Do you ever dream in code?" "Actually... how did you know that?" [12:35]
"People think when it's about assembly and reverse engineering, omg it's untouchable... No, I'm telling you there is [a] much more lower level than that."
"I feel bad when I get sick because I don't go to work... I don't (get to) open my laptop and... code."
"When I'm far from my computer for two or three days... [I get] depressed."
"You can make it part of your day." [22:52]
"I wanted to send them the new domain controller password with the report. " [25:23]