The first RSA Conference took place 30 years ago. It was conceived by the then-CEO Jim Bidzos, and consisted of roughly 50 people in a room discussing cryptography – the focus area of that first assembly. By the turn of the millennium, the conference expanded internationally, reaching audiences in Europe, China, Singapore and Abu Dhabi. Ten years later in 2011, the RSA Conference boasted an impressive 18,500 attendees in the United States alone.
While the cybersecurity community has been awed by the sheer growth in attendance, the RSA Conference has also evolved in many more qualitative ways. From initially a niche gathering in the corners of the cybersecurity world, it has developed into a more inclusive collective with a keen focus on business objectives.