DEF CON 34 • Agency

Policy @ DEF CON

Hacker policy that focuses on practical safety, public-interest research, and people-first design.

Why this exists

Policy and engineering need each other in the same room.

Policy @ DEF CON helps technical people and public-interest stakeholders bring realistic system understanding into policy conversations.

Translate real-world security, infrastructure, and platform tradeoffs into clear decisions people can act on.

Compare policy language against how systems fail under pressure, then adjust before harm scales.

Prioritize privacy, fairness, and user control when technical safeguards and governance rules meet.

Agency in practice

These are the recurring formats and methods used at DEF CON for practical, grounded policy exchange.

Small group conversations that focus on concrete policy dilemmas and practical recommendations.

Technical findings are framed in plain language with clear trade-offs and assumptions.

Discussion around user control, open standards, and safer defaults in platform design and infrastructure.

Research teams, policy teams, and practitioners identify overlap and keep the conversation useful.

Policy signal lab

A short, tactile way to map technical observation into a practical next step.

Signal: Agency

Name the system pressure, identify who is exposed, and propose the policy adjustment that restores meaningful options.

Useful references

Primary sources are linked once below, so claims stay clear and verifiable.

Connect

Primary community channels and official points of contact.