Larry Pesce

Larry Pesce is a cybersecurity leader, researcher, and educator with more than 25 years of experience in security, penetration testing, wireless assessments, and hardware hacking. Before joining Secure Ideas, he served as Vice President of Services at Finite State, where he focused on IoT security. Earlier in his career, he spent many years leading security and disaster recovery efforts in healthcare.

Larry’s expertise spans penetration testing, wireless security, IoT and embedded device security, hardware hacking, and software-defined radio. A SANS Instructor since 2007, he co-authored SEC617: Wireless Penetration Testing and Ethical Hacking and co-created SEC556: IoT Penetration Testing. He holds multiple SANS certifications and is a faculty member of the SANS Technology Institute, where he is also pursuing his Master of Science in Information Security Engineering (MSISE). He is co-author of several books, including Linksys WRT54G Ultimate Hacking, Using Wireshark and Ethereal, and How to Cheat at Configuring Open Source Security Tools.

Larry has been a lifelong tinkerer. As a child he helped his dad build the family television from a kit. It caught fire twice, and he helped fix it both times. That curiosity led him to study computer information systems and work in network engineering, until a security issue pulled him into information security. The support he received from the infosec community inspired him to pass his knowledge on to the next generation.

Larry co-hosts Paul’s Security Weekly, an internationally award-winning security podcast. He is an Extra Class Amateur Radio operator (WB1FTL) and enjoys building electronics, woodworking, and blacksmithing.