Exploring the Wonders of Science and Technology - Guess the Real (non-AI) Picture

Emily Barker (she/her) is a queer solo mom living in Carlsbad, CA. She was at Cisco Systems for 10 years in product and program management until laid off with 4500 other Cisconians. She is set to graduate from the first US cohort of Cyberpsychology with her Master’s of Science from Norfolk State University in the Summer of 2024. 

 Barker has researched technostress, digital wellness, zoom fatigue, videoconferencing best practices, artificial time and urgency, social engineering, and the evolution of hackers and hacker motivations. She seeks to aid in the learnings and spark the conversations to enable all humans to examine their relationship with the virtual world without feeling trapped, scared, or helpless. 

She started her journey in the cyber realm and Internet Security in 2006 at a company called Anonymizer. That same year her MySpace login and Yahoo email accounts got locked out and showed up on Igotpwned.com. She proceeded to become an expert in anonymity, privacy, security, and software VPNs in practice and in learnings. 

 With the diagnosis of bipolar in 2000 and entering recovery in 2001, Emily is intimately familiar with the emotional, physical, and spiritual roller coaster that comes with mood swings, cravings, spiritual awakenings, boundary setting, and medicine adjustments. She had the added diagnoses of ADHD in 2012 and found a new journey of medication adjustments and insights into her youth and young adulthood. She believes in the need to learn something every day and that all humans have worth and value. She deepened her commitment and spiritual practice in 2015 joining the Palomar Unitarian Universalist Fellowship. She thrives in being an atheist that goes to church.