Omaha Security Community

Each week, we’ll highlight a major city in the US and cover the places and events you can go to in that area to get your security information fix. This post is part of the information security communities.

While many of you might think of Omaha as just a place for steaks or baseball games, somethink of it as a center of a great infosec community. Here are some local professional groups you will find in the area.

• OWASP Omaha Local Chapter – OWASP is a non-profit professional association that regularly meets to discuss the top issues in web application security. This chapter has a mailing list, which you might be interested in.
• ISSA Omaha – Interestingly enough, this chapter’s site is built on Tumblr. Go check it out to get more info.
• Omaha Chapter of ISACA – ISACA also haas a presence in Omaha. There is a schedule of meetings and trainings and a catalogue of past presentations worth looking at.
• NEbraskaCERT Cyber Security Forum – Meetings for this group are every third Wednesday and subscribe to the list to get in. Check out the link for past presentations.
• InfraGard Omaha – At its most basic level, InfraGard is a cooperative undertaking between the U.S. Government (led by the FBI) and an association of businesses, academic institutions, state and local law enforcement agencies, and other participants dedicated to increasing the security of United States critical infrastructures.
• AITP Omaha – If you want to join other more general IT practitioners, AITP is for you. View their meeting schedule (every third Thursday) and blog for more info.

If formality isn’t your thing, there is a local meeting you can go to instead.

• Omaha 2600 – Meeting for this group are every first Friday  at the Westroads food court. Learn a lot from them at their meetings and better yet, brush up on their history.

Got an itchy soldering finger? Okay, soldering irons don’t have triggers but you know what I mean. If you do, go ahead and check out these hackerspaces.

• Omaha Maker Group – If you like to make stuff, this is the place to be. Meetings are every Tuesday at the Peter Kiewit Institute. Want more info? Bookmark their mailing list, events board, meeting minutes and Twitter feed.
• Omaha Hackerspace – There’s also one space in the works. Not sure if it got the follow through or not though.

Finally, there is one security event that you may (or may not) be looking forward to.

• NEbraskaCERT – While the last event was on 2009, there’s still a lot of activity here. Step back a bit at the CSF link above for more info.

There might be a few groups and events we missed. If so, feel free to chime in at the comments.