BSides Roanoke 2026 Speakers

Darren Manners is a veteran cybersecurity architect, offensive security leader, and platform builder with more than two decades of experience operating at the intersection of advanced threat simulation, incident response, and autonomous security systems.

Darren has led the design and delivery of large-scale offensive security and continuous testing platforms used by enterprises to validate real-world risk — not just theoretical compliance. His work spans penetration testing, red teaming, adversary emulation, cloud security, and the development of agent-driven security orchestration systems that move beyond alerting into autonomous action.

Holding elite industry certifications including CCIE Security, SANS GSE, OSCP, CRTP, and GPEN, Darren is known for translating complex technical concepts into practical, operational strategies for security leaders. He has built and advised security programs across global enterprises, critical infrastructure, and highly regulated environments.

Today, Darren focuses on the emerging shift toward agentic AI in cybersecurity, exploring how autonomous offensive and defensive agents can continuously test, detect, and respond to threats at machine speed. His work challenges traditional SOC models and advocates for self-driving security operations designed to outpace modern adversaries.

Greg Schaffer is an information security advisor, author, and former practicing virtual CISO with more than 35 years of experience in information technology and security. He is the founder and president of vCISO Services, LLC, a veteran-owned consulting firm that has provided fractional CISO and information security risk management services to small and midsized organizations since 2017.

Greg has served as a CISO or vCISO across a wide range of industries including banking and financial services, healthcare, higher education, aviation, SaaS, and local government. His experience spans building and operating security programs aligned to frameworks such as NIST CSF, ISO 27001/2, FFIEC, PCI DSS, SOC 2, and CMMC.

In addition to consulting, Greg is the host and producer of The Virtual CISO Moment podcast and the author of Information Security for Small and Midsized Businesses. He is currently writing a new book, So You Want To Be An Information Security Consultant, which draws on real-world lessons learned building and operating an independent consulting practice.

Greg is passionate about practical security, professional ethics, mentorship, and helping practitioners make informed career decisions grounded in experience rather than hype.

Jonathan Kimmitt currently serves as Chief Information Security Officer for Alias Cybersecurity. Jonathan has supported Security and Privacy initiatives for organizations for over 20 years. He supports clients in incident response and program development for IT, cybersecurity and privacy departments and AI governance. An active member of the community, he currently the CISO Showdown Champion of Oklahoma, presented on cyber & privacy topics at over 300 events and helps lead community support as a past ISSA President, InfraGard board member, and an adjunct cybersecurity instructor for local small business and entrepreneur training programs. In his professional role, his focus is for industries, professionals, and leaders to grow and develop their security and privacy postures for organizations, employees, and communities.

Kadi is passionate about the DevOps / DevSecOps community since her days of working with COBOL development and Mainframe solutions. At ReversingLabs she collaborates with developers and security researchers to educate to the open source community on software supply chain security. She previously hosted Wicked Good Development and now hosts 10x Insights- a podcast about the future of open source. When she's not working with the developer community, she loves running, traveling, and playing with her dog Milo.

Logan Diomedi is a Roanoke, Virginia native and Principal Offensive Security Consultant at Depth Security. He specializes in offensive security tradecraft and research and has been involved with offensive security engagements at some of the largest companies in the world.

Dr. Nakia L. Avery is an educator, consultant, and organizational leader specializing in compliance systems, leadership development, and high-impact training. With experience supporting K–12 districts and education organizations across Texas and North Carolina, she helps teams strengthen governance, documentation, and accountability to improve outcomes and reduce operational risk. As the founder of Avery Consulting Services LLC, she equips leaders with practical frameworks that simplify complex systems, improve follow-through, and support sustainable performance. Her work bridges people, process, and policy, helping organizations move from reactive problem-solving to structured, scalable success.

Paul Brownridge is Head of Technical Delivery at Pen Test Partners, the ethical hacking firm. Originally from an engineering background, Paul swapped his hard hat for a white hat and has been working in cyber security for the last 10 years. His practical experience of industrial environments and cyber security make for a capable and highly competent OT cyber engineer. Paul is a regular speaker at national and international technology and security events such as Defcon and the (ISC)2 Security Conference, highlighting key risks with the internet of things, automotive and maritime.

Part Red Teamer, part Community Leader, 100% Competitive. Regen Peterson is a Security Consultant at Rapid7 who carries enough certs to be dangerous and a passion for social impact as the Board President for Family Promise of Greater Roanoke. A staple of the Roanoke InfoSec community, he attends several local events and has even helped run the show at conferences such as Hack Red Con and Hack Space Con. When he’s not chaining vulnerabilities to create novel attack paths, he’s likely chaining combos in Super Smash Bros. Melee.

Sean Satterlee is a Senior Principal Penetration Tester for Device Recon Labs, and has Given an RFID hacking workshop at BSidesLV and another workshop at Defcon 24, Spoken at BerlinSides, BsidesOK, IWS, RMISC and local Infragard chapters. Sean has been active the security industry for over 20 years, and a member of the DCG405, OKC2600 and the Telephreak:2600 groups.