About Me

Hey! I'm Christopher (stof) Langton

Career

My background includes extensive experience in cybersecurity services and software engineering. I have specialized in areas such as application security, threat modeling, secure coding training, and cloud platforms. Over the years, I have had the privilege of providing strategic advisory services and security assessments to notable organizations, including TAFE NSW, CSIRO, Sportsbet, ANZ Bank, Fox Sports, and Pexa, among others. With over 50 consulting engagements and counting, I have gained valuable insights into various industries, including Big Data, AI, Machine Learning, FinTech, Real Estate, Australian Government, Open Banking, and Open Energy.

Additionally, I am the founder of a Software-as-a-Service company called Trivial Security. This innovative venture offers free attack surface assessments to small businesses and projects, with a paid tier designed to protect larger or enterprise-scale web applications. Trivial Security also supports cyber insurance, compliance, and security professionals, providing them with the tools and expertise needed to safeguard their digital assets.

Personal

The thing you need to know about me today is I'm a father and husband first, and sometimes I get to enjoy some outdoors activities like snowboarding, kayaking, fishing, and multi-day hiking (but it's been a while).

If you catch me online I'm likely coding something, writing a novel, or mistakenly left something online while working and unlikely to reply for a while. I can't recall the last time I found enjoyment out of playing games, the endorphins of outdoor activities and sense of achievement in coding or writing made gaming feel so.. fake.

What motivates me?

The past rules everyone, if you disagree they call that denial. Own it, use the past as a tool, learn, grow, leverage it going forward. You are the one in control of the past, it does not control you.

Yet the past does define who you are, it's those early life experiences that shaped you, and continue to influence your future. You decide how.

I share my story a lot more lately, in contrast to not telling anyone but a handful of very close people to me for more than 20 years. It was an ordeal surviving a harsh upbringing, I felt like a victim for much of it. I can give you an idea with high level themes of homelessness, an environment teeming with bikers, squatters, a tumultuous pub life, homes torched by arson, and the bitter tang of domestic violence - all before I turned 16.

Something that contradicts my 'good boy' reputation, and confuses people who know I hold government security clearance, was landing in jail.. No criminal history obviously, and even if there was I was a minor at the time. I can speak about it openly these days, it was all due to my mother's boyfriend beating on her, and me defending her, at least the best a child could against an adult brawler biker type. It was ultimately dumb, I found myself standing in judgement, looking over at the woman who gave birth to me taking the side of her abuser - setting me on my 4th and final path of homelessness that motivated me to become who I am today.

The previous time we were homeless was due to the same man, the father of my half-sister. It took a 15 year old (me) leaving school to work in a factory line, to pay rent, buy beds for my 3 younger siblings, a fridge, washing machine. The high level struggle is easy to write, but it was harder than can be put into words. Astonishingly I found a will power, that I had no idea I had until realising it much later in life, that solved homelessness then - and a year later when I was truly alone and homeless. This time two of my siblings were being cared for by their family, and because the way our flawed laws work, my youngest sibling was with our mother, and her abusive father. Because he was there, I couldn't be. I was only allowed to worry about myself - and to this day I felt like I had abandoned my sister.

These, and many more insanely unbelievable experiences, has equipped me with a unique perspective. Those terrible experiences are my tools, I wield them for good, they have provided me a fertile ground from which narratives spring to life on the pages I write. They saturate thriller, suspense, and crime stories with a gripping realism from the perspective of someone who has seen, smelt, felt similar life events.

I am truly excited to share my passion for cybersecurity and realistic storytelling through my books. It is my hope that readers will not only enjoy the thrilling narratives but also gain a deeper understanding of the real-world implications of cybersecurity, and the impacts they have on our modern society.

Thank you for visiting my page, and I look forward to taking you on an exhilarating ride through the Sentinel Unleashed series and beyond.

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