Meanwhile pseudonym hacking continues (e.g. Phineas Fisher) and interesting data dumps make their way to journalists ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradise_Papers)
The NSA / MI# / [Military Intel of Country X] know me. I know them. I don't do shit. They don't do shit beyond some pranks and exchanging banter. What are people so paranoid about?
When you get to meet the boogeymen, they have amazing tech developed by someone else, but the people who use it are stupid, incompetent, paranoid military average joes who more often than not shoot themselves on the foot or cause the problem they were trying to prevent because they never de-escalate.
Secrecy, violence and a carefully-built media reputation just hides how ineffective they are despite mass surveillance and infiltration of all public online communities.
If you are able to think critically about risks, going to Defcon isn't very risky.
Mass surveillance means that "the man" probably knows[1] you have an interest in security whether you attend or not.
Hackers of many skill levels attend Defcon... merely showing up isn't going to suddenly make the FBI start bugging you.
[1] https://thehackernews.com/2014/07/beware-of-nsa-if-you-are-p...