PirOps: What 18th-Century Piracy can Teach Us about SecOps
Aron Eidelman
BSidesSF 2024 · Day 1
In his BSidesSF 2024 talk, "PirOps: What 18th-Century Piracy can Teach Us about SecOps," Aron Eidelman draws a compelling and unexpected parallel between the operational practices of 18th-century Atlantic pirates and modern security operations (SecOps) and Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) principles. Eidelman, leveraging his experience at Google working with SRE teams, argues that the unique social and operational structures adopted by pirates during their "Golden Age" offer profound insights into building effective, resilient, and human-centric security teams. The talk demystifies popular pirate myths to reveal a sophisticated, emergent culture focused on collaboration, risk management, and employee well-being, which directly maps to contemporary best practices in technology and security.
AI review
This talk cleverly uses the analogy of 18th-century pirates to illustrate core SRE and SecOps principles, focusing on generative culture, toil reduction, and functional leadership. While not a deep dive into a new exploit or defensive technique, it provides valuable insights into how security teams can be structured and operated more effectively. The historical context makes established concepts fresh and engaging, offering actionable takeaways for improving team dynamics and operational resilience.