Felicity went to college leaving for M.I.T. (class of 2009). She had an incident with a stalker in her freshmen year.
During her senior year, Felicity dated fellow computer whiz Cooper Seldon. Both of them were members of a hactivist group on campus, along with Cooper's roommate Myron Forest, as well as part of a cybergoth subculture.
Felicity, along with Cooper and Myron, developed a "super virus" which was originally meant for noble actions - digitally defacing criminals, exposing government fraud. At one point, Cooper attempted to use the program to hack into the campus' infrastructure to delete all the student loans. Felicity, shocked by his action, stopped him by pulling the plug. Cooper scolded Felicity telling her you'd only be a "hacker or a hero", though they later made up. Cooper was then arrested by the FBI for his hack attempt and he went to prison. Felicity tried to get him out by confessing she'd written the virus. However, Cooper told her he'd already confessed, taking the fall for her. When Cooper was about to sentenced, he hanged himself to Felicity's devastation. Later on, Felicity dyed her hair blonde, changing her image leaving her hacktivist days behind her, saying "this is the new me."
Felicity graduated from MIT with a master's degree in Cyber Security and Computer Sciences. Later on she moved to Starling City to work at Queen Consolidated.