About Me (the long version)

I was born and raised on the south side of the Big Island of Hawaii. I lived above a small town called Kainaliu on a coffee farm. My mom, also native to the Big Island, raised my sister and me with our grandmother. When I was 14, I got accepted into a Native Hawaiian boarding school called Kamehameha Schools on a full scholarship. To attend the school, I lived on Oahu for four years boarding at Kamehameha.

At Kamehameha I first stated to pursue my interests in computer science. I was first drawn into the love for programming by my favorite game Minecraft. I taught myself Java, and a little Python, so that I could understand how programs worked. In my free periods at school, I would mess with the way MacOS identified good and bad programs through their App packaging system. I was a complete noob to security, but I found fun in messing with how systems work.

With some struggle, I started attending Arizona State University. There, I joined the pwndevils. I started CTFing each weekend. Eventually, I started doing good enough to be invited to do a Ph.D. at the lab I had started working at as an undergrad. The rest is history.