SecTalks Gold Coast 3x6 - July 2026 - The Autonomous Software Factory

Gold Coast SecTalks for July is Tuesday, 7th July, 2026, at COHORT Innovation Space.

The Autonomous Software Factory: Trusting Code No Human Wrote

What happens when a human writes a single paragraph of intent, and AI agents independently design, write, test, and merge the codebase without anyone ever reading the diff?

In this talk, we’ll look under the hood of a live research prototype built to answer that question. Operating on the core assumption that the AI agents are hostile, we will explore the strict defensive engineering required to deploy machine-generated code safely, dive into the architectural blind spots that still remain, and discuss the future of software engineering when code becomes a disposable, automated medium.

Lachlan Ashcroft is a Software Engineer and SRE with a background in Identity and Access Management and Fintech. His career has spanned the full tech stack, from product development to developer tooling, with a consistent focus on building secure, scalable, and resilient systems. Lachlan is a strong advocate for "Model-First Architecture," exploring how to evolve the software development lifecycle through AI-augmented development. He specializes in bridging the gap between engineering and security.

Drinks are provided by our sponsor, Solis, and pizza is provided by Cyber Audit Team. As usual, our venue is sponsored by COHORT.

GC SecTalks maintains a strict Code of Conduct.