Security Analyst at Ubuntu Guard Cyber
Nikita Alam is a Security Analyst at Ubuntu Guard Cyber and a third-year BSc Information Systems and Technology student. She specialises in cybersecurity awareness, helping South Africans understand the real digital threats affecting them today, beyond the scenarios that are often portrayed in movies.
This panel opens with a live demonstration of exactly that scenario: a real infection playing out step-by-step in a controlled environment, from download to full account compromise. It shows what can actually happen when you run a single executable file you thought you could trust. From there, we break it down. Why “trusted” repack sites aren’t always as safe as communities believe. Why a VPN doesn’t protect what most people think it does. Why antivirus software sometimes misses these threats. And most importantly, why this isn’t hypothetical, it’s already happening to South Africans right now. The second half of the session focuses on practical action. What to do before something goes wrong. What to do in the first 60 seconds after a compromise. And how to set up your digital life so that one bad download becomes a manageable mistake instead of a disaster. Through this live demonstration, we will ask interactive questions, and we have little prizes to use during our session to keep the audience engaged.
