Back in February it was announced that I would be heading to one of my all time favorite places, New York City, to cover the Artificial Intelligence Cybersecurity Conference. What’s this AI4 Cybersecurity conference all about you ask? The Ai4 Cybersecurity conference brings together business leaders, data practitioners, and AI pioneers who are applying artificial intelligence to solve problems and create opportunities in the cybersecurity industry. Right here is what makes this special, we’re taking a break of our typical conference coverage — usually video game or Apple-related — and switching gears to something more security oriented.

Now a days it’s no doubt how important cybersecurity really is, especially what seems to be on a semi-frequent basis of data breeches or hacks that expose customer data. Last year it was estimated that information security spending would exceed $124 billion in 2019, which is no small figure when you take into account what else companies could be spending money on, such as research and development.

Moving forward though the AI4 Cyberseucrity conference will run for two days, Monday and Tuesday, from 8AM to about 5PM give or take. Here’s a rough outline of the daily schedule.

Monday morning the conference keynote will be held by Mark Segal, the NSA’s Chief of the Computer & Analytics Sciences Research Group. According to the conference agenda he will take stage to present “AI@NSA: From Artificial Intelligence to Signals Intelligence and Cybersecurity”.

From a content and informational standpoint, this will be an excellent conference as cybersecurity is an ever evolving and growing space. As hackers change their methods and tools, so must companies adapt and grow to meet their cybersecurity demands. Even self-managed websites such as PocketFullOfApps have to stay onto of security updates and any potential breaches. All in all I’m looking forward to this week’s conference as there should be lots of good content and takeaways to write about.

For the first time in PocketFullOfApps history this year we’re switching things up and heading to the Ai4 Cybersecurity Conference that’s taking place in one of my favorite cities of all time, New York City. Typically our conference coverage typically includes something in the realm of mobile gaming or Apple-related content, however, over the last couple years general technology news had been added into the mix in response to readership changes.

Seen as how the Ai4 Cybersecurity Conference is going to be a combination of cybersecurity and AI, this comes at no better time due to the recent flaw in Apple’s Facetime allowing people to eavesdrop on unsuspecting users. Because our world relies so much on technology, whether it’s mobile or not, cybersecurity is a huge part of what companies have to invest in today.

As a two day conference taking place on April 29th and April 30th, there’s plenty of good content on the agenda. Representatives from companies like Walmart, TD Ameritrade, HarperCollins, and plenty more will be in attendance giving lectures and presenting on a variety of topics. Here’s a quick list of some speakers you can expect (full list here):

• John Prokap, CISO, HarperCollins
• Vernon Habersetzer, Senior Enterprise Technical Expert, Walmart
• Ricardo Lafosse, CISO, Morningstar
• Rehman Khan, Director – Cloud Security, TD Ameritrade
• Thomas Owen, CISO, University of Texas Rio Grande Valley
• Jason Odell, Director, Incident Response, Walmart
• Brett Tucker, Technical Manager, CERT/CMU
• Joe Greene, CISO, American Chemical Society

In terms of content coverage, as always you can expect plenty of photos, summaries, and hopefully we can get a couple of interviews in as well. If you’re interested in attending, early bird Ai4 Cybersecurity tickets are available for $1,195, and also includes access to after-conference networking events.

After that date has passed we’re not sure what tickets will increase to, however, it is definitely something it keep in mind. As the conference draws near we’ll be sure to keep you updated on any changes and announcements that come out of Ai4 Cybersecurity as well.

In nearly the 10 years that PocketFullOfApps has existed, we’ve covered our fair share of conferences with each varying in nature. For example Collision Conference in Las Vegas was a mix of technology and games, while Casual Connect is mostly geared towards indie developers. Heck, we even covered Mac World many years ago while it existed.

Even though every conference varies just a bit, they make for excellent topics of interest for our readers. Typically our coverage includes a whole lot of photos, daily round ups of what happened at the conference, interviews, and if any company makes a big announcement. In addition there’s been times where we’ll have a dedicate piece of something that really catches our interest, for example a particular game or lecture that really stood out.

Due to the nature of conferences and the logistics behind it with lodging, travel, transportation, and more, it’s never a cheap affair. As of right now we’ve got one conference slated to cover this year (article coming soon) with more in the works. Conferences are a busy time for PocketFullOfApps, and usually we see a bump in social media activity and traffic to the website.

So if you’re a publisher, developer, or product owner looking to get additional promotion get in contact with us to learn how you can sponsor our conference coverage for 2019. Or if you’re a conference organizer looking to get your conference covered by press, get in touch as well, as we’d love to make something work.

Even better yet, EA will welcome hundreds of local High School and University students in the live press conference audience. Following the press conference, an exclusive panel discussion will be held for these students featuring EA leaders and moderated by Tracy Fullerton, Director of USC’s Games Program, to discuss various career opportunities in the video game industry. Next up, EA’s press conference will stream live at their website on Monday June 15th, at 1:00 PM PDT.