Ela grew up in East Germany during the 1980s, where they were introduced to computers and electronics at a young age. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, Ela became deeply involved in the hacker scene, joining the Chaos Computer Club, attending early DEFCONs, and witnessing the merging of East and West German hacker cultures. Ela made the transition into professional security work, dealing with APT investigations, incident response, and eventually moving into security architecture and management roles. It's a fantastic conversation with a ton of unique lessons and ideas.