Event: Uber Security Open House
We’re pleased to invite you to our first Uber Security Open House on March 16, 2016!
The event will feature both tech talks from members of our team and opportunities to network with people both inside and outside of Uber Security.
We hope you’re able to join us – please RSVP today and look out for more information headed your way as we get closer to the event.
Event schedule:
5:30pm – Check-in, Food, Drink
6:00pm – Tech Talks
7:00pm – 9:00pm Food, Drink, Networking
More info can be found here. We hope to see you on the 16th!
Group: Uber Engineering
Experience: I was torn between attending this event and the Python Project Night event. Project night had a few interesting tutorials and I miss playing with Python, so it was awfully tempting. As for the Uber event, the main word was mystery. I was curious about their office, the people, and the work that they’re doing. The RSVP for the event was never updated, so I had no idea what the tech talks would be about. I don’t know a ton about security, so I went in blind, hoping that the topics wouldn’t be too much over my head.
My roommate agreed to go with me, even though she is working mostly on UI/UX work. Turns out that the event was not at Uber’s office that was close to my house, but was downtown near my old office. Uber’s offices were modest, but everyone seemed nice and approachable. During registration we had to sign an NDA, which was a definite first for me as far as meetups go.
The food and drink were the most generous of the meetups that I’ve been to so far: plenty of delicious Patxi’s pizza (thin crust and deep dish!) and an open tap along with wine. I guess basically we were rolling like Uber employees. 🙂 After a little mingling, the talks started. The focus was on Uber’s security team, and it was definitely fascinating to hear the unique cybersecurity issues that Uber faces. It was pretty data sciencey, and it turned out that some folks from the data science bootcamp that I was considering way back when were there. I talked to them, and left confident in my choice to not go down that path. Data science is cool for sure, but not what I want to do for a job.
Verdict: I’m glad that I went. I’ve had this image in my head of Uber as a bunch of super smart people doing crazy things with data, and while that may be true, this just made the overall company seem more human and likeable to me. Everyone was nice and just really wanted to talk about security, LOL. I’m in the Uber Engineering group on Meetup, and will probably go to another talk in the future.