It’s been 3 years since I kicked off the Hacker Blood Drive. Blood and plasma donations have been something I’ve been passionate about for a few years now. If you’ve never heard of the Hacker Blood Drive, essentially I hope to encourage hackers to consider donating by offering a free subscription to Hack The Box or Pentester Lab.

Personal Stats

This year was a slower year for me due to getting some tattoos overseas (there’s a 4 month wait period afterwards). Along with a lot of work travel I was only able to donate a total of 9 times this year. I did however hit a nice milestone of 150 donations this year.

Raising Awareness

Overall the main objective of this project was to raise awareness of donations and over the years it’s reach grows further and further. This year I have had at least 8 people reach out to me who have donated because of this cause, both in and out of cybersecurity. Of those people, most of them have donated multiple times, but even at a conservative 1 donation, that’s 24 lives.

Next Year

Next year I’ve got some bigger plans, I am currently in talks with 2 security conferences where I’m hoping to have a donation drive of some sort during the conference. But let’s see how we go!

Conclusion

This year was a slower year for my personal donations but a much bigger year for the cause. I’ve got a few fun ideas to grow the projects reach next year, let’s see how they pan out! Thanks to everyone who has donated and reached out to me letting me know. I love hearing about it!

Happy holidays!