US Air Force Space Security Challenge 2020: Hack-a-Sat
1–10 of 93 posts
Re: US Air Force Space Security Challenge 2020: Hack-a-Sat
#2>>Participants who successfully complete a set of qualification challenges on cybersecurity and space this spring will be invited to the ultimate challenge: to (ethically) hack a satellite.
Lol. That is so military public affairs. You are allowed to hack a satellite after being vetted and approved by government. Are Canadians allowed to participate? How about Russians? What about crypto-anarchists who will never pass a military-type background check? I cannot think of a less hacker-friendly competition.
How about this: Just launch the damn satellite. Tell us which rocket it is on (I assume it is a ride share) and give 100k to the first team that manages to broadcast a rickroll.
Bonus round: An extra 100k for any team that leverages the sat to listen in to the spysat network, the one operating on 60 GHz so that it cannot be heard from the ground directly. (Fyi, if you want to meet some men in black, try putting some 60GHz capability on your cubesat. They no like anything that might jam that spectrum.)
Re: US Air Force Space Security Challenge 2020: Hack-a-Sat
#3My work focuses primarily on consumer application development, however cybersecurity and CTF challenges like this have always been an interest.
What specific technical skills are required to successfully complete challenges like this?
Re: US Air Force Space Security Challenge 2020: Hack-a-Sat
#4>>Participants who successfully complete a set of qualification challenges on cybersecurity and space this spring will be invited to the ultimate challenge: to (ethically) hack a satellite. Lol. That is so military public affairs. You are allowed to hack a satellite after being vetted and approved by government. Are Canadians allowed to participate? How about Russians? What about crypto-anarchists who will never pass…
Government aside, it’s an extremely standard CTF format to have an online qualifier, and is (more or less) how the normal DEFCON CTF itself works.
Re: US Air Force Space Security Challenge 2020: Hack-a-Sat
#5[deleted]
Re: US Air Force Space Security Challenge 2020: Hack-a-Sat
#6>>Participants who successfully complete a set of qualification challenges on cybersecurity and space this spring will be invited to the ultimate challenge: to (ethically) hack a satellite. Lol. That is so military public affairs. You are allowed to hack a satellite after being vetted and approved by government. Are Canadians allowed to participate? How about Russians? What about crypto-anarchists who will never pass…
> Are Canadians allowed to participate? How about Russians? What about crypto-anarchists who will never pass a military-type background check?
Yes. As long as there's at least one US citizen or permanent resident on your team, and you're not a specially designated national, you're allowed to participate.
Re: US Air Force Space Security Challenge 2020: Hack-a-Sat
#7>>Participants who successfully complete a set of qualification challenges on cybersecurity and space this spring will be invited to the ultimate challenge: to (ethically) hack a satellite. Lol. That is so military public affairs. You are allowed to hack a satellite after being vetted and approved by government. Are Canadians allowed to participate? How about Russians? What about crypto-anarchists who will never pass…
[deleted]
Re: US Air Force Space Security Challenge 2020: Hack-a-Sat
#8>>Participants who successfully complete a set of qualification challenges on cybersecurity and space this spring will be invited to the ultimate challenge: to (ethically) hack a satellite. Lol. That is so military public affairs. You are allowed to hack a satellite after being vetted and approved by government. Are Canadians allowed to participate? How about Russians? What about crypto-anarchists who will never pass…
> Are Canadians allowed to participate? How about Russians? What about crypto-anarchists who will never pass a military-type background check? I cannot think of a less hacker-friendly competition.
The answers to your questions are in the rules.
Re: US Air Force Space Security Challenge 2020: Hack-a-Sat
#9>>Participants who successfully complete a set of qualification challenges on cybersecurity and space this spring will be invited to the ultimate challenge: to (ethically) hack a satellite. Lol. That is so military public affairs. You are allowed to hack a satellite after being vetted and approved by government. Are Canadians allowed to participate? How about Russians? What about crypto-anarchists who will never pass…
> Are Canadians allowed to participate? How about Russians? What about crypto-anarchists who will never pass a military-type background check? Yes. As long as there's at least one US citizen or permanent resident on your team, and you're not a specially designated national, you're allowed to participate.
>> The Team Leader must be a U.S. citizen, must speak English and will serve as the official technical point of contact for communications with the HAS organizers.
So ya, Canadians are allowed but only if the boss is a US citizen. Don't see any resident language. I make the point because some of the best satellite spotters/finders/hackers are Canadians, such Scott Tilley who was recently in the news for finding a long-forgotten navigation sat. Or Ted Molczan who may have spotted the legendary Prowler sat.
(This is natural. Canadians are better positioned to spot satellites due to their darker sky and the longer dawn/dusk periods of higher latitudes.)
Re: US Air Force Space Security Challenge 2020: Hack-a-Sat
#10$14 billion 2020 budget for the USAF space portfolio[1], $50 thousand prize (split between entire team) to reveal detailed procedure to hack the USAF space portfolio. I feel like they should be a bit more generous here.
[1] https://www.af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/1783601/air-...