I'm deviant. Many of you may have seen me at the lockpick area over the years. I've spoken at
roots about lockpicking in the past. I'm not here to talk about lockpicking. I'm here to talk
about other types of hands-on activities, though, working with other kinds of tools and other
kinds of projects. As Tara and other people who know me can tell you, I build a lot of stuff. I
create a lot of stuff. I fix a lot of stuff. And it occurs to me that there's one theme that I
always keep coming back to if you want to try to get kids and all of you kids want to get into
making and building and fixing things. It came to me when I was looking at this really old ad.
I've worn Doc Boots for a while, growing up as like a punky kid. So this old ad, really
prominent on this ad is the word withstand. And that's going to be our theme across the
world. Because what you do and what you create has to be able to withstand the conditions and
the ways you're using it. I remember like the three little pigs story, right? The different
houses. The house of straw, the house of wood, the house of bricks. Which one could withstand
the wolf? Well, you need to be stronger and withstand. And it's going to be, believe me, far
less frustrating when you make things and build things if they withstand what you're trying to
do. You won't get frustrated if your project doesn't fall apart. I remember when I was a kid,
I used to play with scotch tape. It was my favorite thing to make stuff with. But scotch tape
isn't that strong. And a lot of times my projects, I'd make something out of paper and put sticks
together, but it would just kind of fall apart. And I'd say, oh, well, that wasn't so good. But
then I got allowed to like play with glue. As long as I didn't make a complete mess. And glue was
much stronger and better. And my things would stay together longer. And eventually, you know, I
was trusted with tools. And you start nailing things together. And eventually, you know, I was
trusted with tools. And eventually, you know, I was trusted with tools. And eventually, you know, I
had my own little tool set. And you can really start creating things that will withstand what
you're doing. Now, speaking of interesting uses of tools, this is where being a hacker really
comes in once you start using tools. You don't have to use everything the way it says to on the
box. For example, who can tell me why this person is using two wrenches? What are they doing?
Shout it out. It needs more torque. It needs more leverage. This is a
cool little hack that you can do just by putting your tools together in a different way. Let's say
you need to fill some fluid into something and you don't have a funnel. This person right here, he or
she is pouring this oil right down a screwdriver and not spilling it all over this engine. This
person is sharpening a woodworking chisel by using a belt sander. I don't know if I would recommend
that, actually, if you're a kid. But it's using things in different ways. This is the kind of
stuff that really inspires me. So we have over here, let's see. This is the kind of stuff that
we have. Let's see what we have. Come on, map top. Here we have using towel bars to, like, store
things because this is better than the storage rack this person had in their home. Come on. This is
how we store stuff in our home, in our lab. This is just a metal plate on the wall, a steel
plate. And we put a bunch of heavy duty magnets on all of our wires and things. And you can see,
what did I use to? I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't
know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't
know. But this is how we store stuff. I used to put my magnets on with that... What's that
blue stuff, do you think? That's just tape, right? Well, the tape wouldn't withstand. The tape
would get gummy and gunky and fall off. So all the rest of them we actually use heat shrink. If
you're allowed to do anything with, like, heated tools... Oh, man, heat shrink is fun stuff in all
different sizes. So that's our cable wall. Now here's the part I really want you to think about,
though, when you're going to the store, when you want to get supplies to make a project work, it's
not always a kind of walk-through in the store. The thing I really want you to do is, when you're
easy to explain what you're trying to do if you're a hacker. Because everything has its
original purpose, right? Like there's this product and it does X. But you're not trying to do
X. You're trying to do something completely different. And you sort of are doing this dance
at the store where you're like, well, I'm trying, I need something that's about this tall and
it needs to be round, but I'm going to put some nails into it. And instantly people in the
store always want to ask you, well, what are you making? What do you need to do? You're
usually going to be doing something outside of its regular purpose. Try to get good at
explaining the properties of the thing you need. You don't just walk up to the electric
department and say, I need a really bright light. You say something like, well, I need
something that will be really bright, but it will also fit in a small space and I'm not going
to be plugging it into the outlet. I'm going to try to run it off of a car battery. And
then someone says, why? By the way, your best answer ever, and as a kid, you've never
thought you could do this, school project. The instant you say something is for a school
project, instantly people, they're just, okay, I guess it's for a school project. That's strange.
And they'll let you, they'll just let you buy stuff. It's great. So here's a great example of
using something not the way it was intended. My wife really loves to take baths. Like every
bathtub, though, you've seen that, like, overflow valve, if you fill the water up this high, it
can't get any higher. And that valve is always ridiculously, that drain is just too low in every
tub, ever. I don't know why it's that low. It, you know, you can't really get in the nice big
bath. So this product exists, right? This is a thing on the store shelf. You can buy it. It's
supposed to cover up the overflow drain. Yeah, there's just one problem. You've bought many of
them. It totally stinks. This is a terrible product. It's leaky. It collects mold. It can't
withstand. It can't do the job. So we said to ourselves, all right, well, what can we do?
Let's, let's look at this problem. We've got an overflow drain. We've got an overflow drain that's
leaking. We've got a tub. We really want to use this. So I started looking around Home Depot,
and I said, well, let me look in the plumbing department for other products, and especially,
like, products for sinks. Kitchen sinks, they have these big stoppers. Now, that's a pretty
good product. It needs to be really tight-fitting. It needs to be a good seal. It needs to
withstand mildew and, you know, conditions like that. So I found this. I found a universal
stopper disposal thing, just by kind of asking, I said, hey, do you have something about this big
and rubber? And I said, yeah. And I said, yeah. And I said, yeah. And I said, yeah. And I said, yeah.
Not trying to explain, well, I want to take my bathtub apart, because that's just a recipe for
someone telling you, no, don't do it that way. But sure enough, I took it home. It even had a
little, little hole right in the middle of it, because there's a handle that I popped off. I
just screwed this right in behind the valve cover. And now that overflow drain looks pretty darn
good. So let's, let's see. Does it pass the test? Let's see what happened. Will it withstand the
conditions? Yes, absolutely. Beautiful. Tub filled all the way up. Doesn't leak. It's
perfect. She's very, very happy with me. Make sure your budget, your wallet, can withstand your
experimentation. This is something I want to also hit for you. You're going to possibly buy seven
different things, trying to figure out which one is the right one. Parents will teach you early
on. It will serve you well. Learn to return. Absolutely learn to return. Don't just let parts
sit around that you don't need. Take them back to the store. Get money back. You don't have to
go back and store credit, because that's going to be your budget for your next project. We have
Amazon Prime, and I think we return 80% of the stuff we buy, because we, I don't know which one is
the right one. Click, add to cart, add to cart, add to cart. Get 20 things in the mail. And
you're like, oh, these two are nice. I'll keep them. 18 of them going back. Also, learn to
repair. Learning to keep your things running, because I'm going to talk to you in a minute
about getting tools of your own and keeping things of your own. You're going to really care
about that investment. You're going to want to keep it running. Learn to repair. Learn to keep your
things running. Learn to do things like sew. I was taught to sew from a very young age, and I was
fixing and changing my clothes. I learned to repair electronics with my mother. She and I
actually repaired the plug on this iron when it had shorted out. That was one of my first
memories of, like, repairing things with tools. Learn plumbing. You can save tons of money in
your life. Maybe even when you're old enough, learn to weld. Oh, my gosh. There's very, if I
show of hands, who can weld in this room? That's not a lot of hands. It is, it is an awesome
skill if you can get good at welding, man. So here we go. You're going to build your own
toolkit sometime. And I'm going to recommend that parents support you in this. And I'm going to
say that, you know, you can borrow, like, parents, you know, here, you can borrow this tool.
But I encourage everyone in this room to let your kids build their own toolkit that is theirs and
theirs alone. And they have to take care of it. They have to pay for it. And it's theirs for when
they need it on projects. You can basically, I'd say, about seven things are what you need in a
good toolkit.
Screwdriver, right off the bat. A six-way screwdriver is super cheap. It's going to be one of the
best investments you have. And it teaches responsibility because they say, hey, where's the
screwdriver? The answer is, it should be in your toolkit. Did you lose it? Go find yours. Now,
you can get better and better. One day you'll get, like, nice electronic screwdrivers or some
tamper bits. I recommend them for getting interesting fasteners off. But right off the hop,
screwdriver. Next, pliers. Pliers, especially with a little nipper on them somewhere. Basic
pliers are fine. Maybe one day you get a Swiss Army knife that has pliers and a nipper or, frankly, a
multi-tool. But as long as you can grab something, yank it, twist it, turn it, and nip it, good. My wife
grew up on a farm. Why do you need those nippers? Bailing wire. A lot of people in this room just
grew up in urban areas. You don't know bailing wire. It belongs in your toolkit and it has a million
uses. What goes along with the old two sayings, you can fix everything with two things, bailing
wire and what else? I heard it back there. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't
care. Duct tape. I prefer gaff tape myself, but yes. Gaff tape is awesome, isn't it? And if you
take your room key when you go home from DEF CON, you use that to roll your gaff tape flat over
your room key. You have a length of it. You can keep that in your small toolkit. Get a good
flashlight. You never know when you're going to need it, but it belongs in your toolkit for a lot
of reasons. Number six, throw in something for measuring because when you're trying to develop a
project, it's really nice to have a quick tape measure to figure out how it's going and one day
you get yourself some little approximators as you do tiny stuff. But a measurement tool. And
lastly, don't discount sewing. I swear to you, I've repaired so many things. Get a sewing kit.
It's probably free at the hotel. Those things belong in every kid's toolkit. And it can be theirs
and it can tackle a billion projects. I am a big advocate of this sort of environment, of letting
people learn, of letting people try, of letting people learn, of letting people try, of letting
people try things that other parents might think are, oh, that's too dangerous. Oh, your kids
might get hurt. No. Like, we've got people on soldering irons. We've got people physically using
the lock picks over there. I have a friend of mine. Her name is Lenore. She has this site,
Free Range Kids, for all the parents. If you've never heard of Lenore Skenazy, check it out. Free
Range Kids kind of parenting would definitely encourage the idea of having your own toolkit. So
absolutely. Get your own toolkit. Build it up. Because in the end, hacking isn't a skill set. It's
a mindset. It's being able to say, I can tackle this problem. It gives you great perseverance from
feeling empowered. Everything you work on, every endeavor you work on is a chance to do something
you couldn't have done before. It's a chance maybe to fail or maybe to do better. There's this
little comic here that I threw in, this guy. This poor guy is sitting here and he's so angry. The
world really hates him, right? Oh, man, why am I getting wet? There's nothing I can do about
this. You don't want to be that guy. You don't want to be someone who can't withstand this. You
want to be able to stand up to the things that are wrong. Just like the person who says, I'm so
angry. And someone says, well, here's something that can fix your problem. And you say, I don't
want to fix my problem. I just want to be angry. Don't be that person. Don't be the person who
can't withstand difficulty. And the sooner you start trying to build projects and they don't
work and then you've got to fix them and try again, the sooner you're overcoming obstacles
with tools that you put together yourself and your own toolkit, you'll be able to withstand a
lot of conditions. Why do I want you to think about this? Again, hacking is just a discipline
that you hone over time. Everything that you try that doesn't work is a chance to learn how to do
it better. Failure is an amazing teacher. You keep attempting over and over until you succeed. I
guarantee you everyone you've ever looked at and admired, oh, look at that thing they built. Oh,
she made this awesome project. What you're not seeing is all the stuff that didn't work before
they got to the point they're at now. Failure will teach you. And if parents trust their kids to
try things, trust them with the tools, trust them with a little toolkit, then the kids will trust in
themselves and you'll be on your way as long as you know what to do in the face of adversity,
which is keep persevering and try to withstand your problems. Thank you very much. Go create.