This year, at the Ground Zero security conference in New Delhi, the audience will witness a talk on the future of cyber security from 8-year-old Reuben Paul, a child prodigy who is already seen as a skilled hacker.

On Friday, the whizkid will deliver a presentation centering on the importance of teaching infosec to children today, in order to benefit from improved security mechanisms in the world of tomorrow.
Kids need to be trained in infosec

“In this talk, Reuben ‘The RAPstar’ Paul will highlight and demonstrate the need for, and what it takes for, developing the current generation with Cybersecurity skills, who he believes are the future of the world - both in physical and in cyberspace,” the presentation abstract says.

The Ground Zero security conference is touted as Asia’s largest collaborative platform for cyber-security experts and researchers. Among its speakers are seasoned security experts and technocrats, as well as members of law enforcement in India and government employees.

Reuben Paul is obviously the youngest speaker at the conference, although his resume rivals that of any other participant, and even shames it in some cases.

Kid held presentations at other conferences, in the US

At 8 years old, he is considered a cyber-security expert and has been invited at various other security gatherings, including this year’s DerbyCon in Louisville, Kentucky, where he talked about insecure code and the attacks stemming from using it.

During the presentation, the prodigy child demonstrated attacks such as injection and reversing. The talk focused not only on the importance of writing secure code, but also on securing the applications using the code.

He also presented at (ISC)² Security Congress this year, where he demonstrated a password cracking tool called Hydra, written by him and his father.
List of skills and endeavors continues

All this should be impressive enough for many, but it appears that the skills of Reuben Paul go well beyond and have been proven in other domains of activity.

He is also the youngest person in the US to have earned the black belt in Shaolin Do Kung Fu; and he did this at the age of seven.

Moreover, in August this year, he created his own company, Prudent Games, where he acts as CEO.

Some of the products created by the enterprise have a security focus, such as Cracker Proof which teaches about building strong passwords, and Crack Me If You Can, a game teaching about brute-force attacks.

Others are education-oriented, an example being Shuriken Math, designed as a simple and fun way for kids to learn math by shooting ninja stars.