For the title alone, you want to look in on Bank of America Corp. vice president Todd Innskeep hosting "Please (insert name of deity here), I Need Some Help! Where Can I Go?" (P2P-207A, Orange Room 236), but who doesn't need a little help now and then finding reliable info? Yes indeed, there is life beyond Google, and he's going to tell you where.

Thursday

The keynotes move quickly today as TippingPoint co-founder Brian Smith speaks at 3:40 p.m. on "The Quiet Revolution in Network Security" (Hall D). It's a fast revolution, too; he's slotted for just 35 minutes, as is Websense Inc. CEO Gene Hodges' equally promising talk on "Security Uncovered: The Naked Truth" (KEY-306, Hall D, 2:45pm). You've also got a noon town hall with Homeland Security assistant secretary Greg Garcia (TOWN-304, Green Room 103). Elsewhere ...

8 a.m. sessions

Another tough set of first-session choices. "Case Studies in Biometric Ethics" (LAW-301, Burgundy Room 131) promises good case-study material on how the system functioned for investigators looking at the Madrid bombings, along with info on what biometric bits various companies and agencies might want from you. The "Time to Exploit: From Vulnerability to Exploit to Malware" talk (HT2-301, Green Room 104) from IBM's Gunter Ollman should be a disquieting look at how the bad guys operate. The session will be 50 minutes long, and one wonders if the process itself is equally fast at this point. Equally disquieting in quite a different direction, you've got GOV-301, "Heard on the Hill: The Cyber Security Legislative Climate" (Burgundy Room 130), just in time for the new congressional session. And if, after days of high-intensity infoflow, you're ready for something a little kinder and gentler, consider "Becoming 'People' People: The Kinder, Gentler Security Professional" (PROF-301, Gold Room 308), instructing attendees in the fine art of not throttling one's more aggressively ignorant end users.