April’s Irvine Underground meeting went very smoothly as it was another success and a great turn out in attendance. The run down went as planned, we gathered at Zanzibar Coffee house around 7:30, and talked outside while the inside was being setup for our meeting. 8 o’clock came and everyone started moving inside getting comfortable and talking to each other and introducing the new people to everyone else.

Introductions proceeded about the group, and the game plan for the night and April’s announcements. Afterwards each person gave a brief introduction about themselves then the topics started. The Irvine Underground cards were passed around for distribution as well as discussing proper places for the cards to be distributed at.

We discussed the wireless which is available throughout Zanzibar and discussed the security/insecurities of wireless technology advising the uninformed what to do and not to do while using it to protect the privacy of yourself. If you’re looking for a place to get a cup of coffee with your laptop then Zanzibar is a good place to do just that as the access is free.

Open floor discussion was welcomed and we talked about what people would like to give and see demonstrations/presentations of and also what everyone was interested in. There were quite a few topics that perked the interest of others so we’re in the works of getting these put into place.

Discussion about the World Wide WarDrive took place, after March’s Cantenna project the interest in wireless increased significantly. We’re sure the Orange County WWWD3 will be a true success with many attendees, more information on WWWD for OC can be found on the IVU message board, feel free to sign up on the board.

Pizza was ordered and delivered to the meeting and everyone feasted while watching videos on laptops. As the food was wrapping up preparations were made for the demonstration for the night. While this was being setup everyone continued to talk and keep active in his or her conversations.

April’s presentation – a hands-on event was a close look at lock picking and the security/strengths of different styles of locks. A lock board was constructed prior to the meeting containing many different styles of door locks, deadbolts, padlocks, and handcuffs. White papers of the MIT Lock Picking Guide were handed out which did a fine job explaining how locks work and showing illustrated figures of the insides of the locks and how they work.

Each person got to test the security of the locks, one after another each person taught each other how they did it, or how they think it should be done, or was done. This went on for a few hours; the insides of the locks, the keys themselves, the different types and the styles of the locks were all discussed.

As we wrapped up at Zanzibar and they closed their doors around 1am we headed out to Denny’s to keep the discussions happening as this is the only place in Irvine that stays open 24/7. Denny’s was full of laughter and talk about the night, about future events. After Denny’s a few of us stayed outside talking and enhancing our lock skills on our demonstration locks. This was the longest gathering, around 4.30-5:00am people finally dispersed and went their ways. This wrapped up the Irvine Underground meeting for April.

Between the March and April meeting there were a few gatherings which also had great turnouts, one was Medieval Times, the other was for a speech given at the Queen Mary on Macintosh security, a very low level (for beginners) speech introducing Mac users to the aspect of security given by Freaky. March and April were busy months for us. Stay tuned for May’s Irvine Underground meeting, join the mailing list if you haven’t done so already to be notified of future events and also check out the message board.