Cat-Shaped Hacker Hardware

Education-focused hardware platforms often fall flat by trying to solve nonexistent problems, or by creating useless all-in-one designs that basically "recreate the Arduino".

When Alex set out to design the "Nugget" - a beginner-friendly, cat-shaped development board catered towards cybersecurity beginners - he was faced with unique challenges in creating a platform that brought both ease-of-use and extensibility to users. He wanted a hands-on design that would make it easy for beginners to learn daunting topics like WiFi security and USB attacks through a guided, streamlined interface - while also offering accessible hardware and software modularity to more advanced users.

The Nugget has been the centerpiece of community workshops, teaching skills in hardware assembly & design, WiFi hacking, Python scripting, and more - and also is fostering the growth of the hacker community by empowering beginners with free, open-source educational content. In this talk, Alex will discuss the challenges he faced in designing a niche, education-focused tool for cybersecurity beginners, and he will outline how his design choices grew this project into a successful startup in just a few months.