Security Ripcord

Well, I think it is pretty well known now that l@stplace is now being affectionately referred to as 3@stplace after this year’s DefCon Capture The Flag (CTF) competition.  I will not have a detailed write-up like I did last year as most of my time was spent banging my head on LosT’s challenges.  If you want to know more about what happened you should check out @tlas’ recap, swing over to the Daily Dave Archives for input from several team members, or check out the write-up at NOSRUS.  These sources say it better than I ever could.

Some interesting CTF stuff that did happen to me, however, is that I got to speak with Invisigoth again, @tlas for the first time in person, and I actually met Mezzendo on the shuttle ride to the Riv.  Getting to speak with these guys is like somebody from the deep South having a conversation with a NASCAR driver or WWE wrestler.  I try not to get all geeked out by other people because, after all, they are just other people.  But it was great to get to interact with them in person rather than virtually.  They were all very personable and seem glad to talk to me.  Unfortunately, although DefCon is a great place to met these guys, their extra time is definitely limited.  Maybe next year I’ll get into a few of the parties and have a better chance to interact with them.

So, congratulations to Sk3wl0fr00t for their domination of so many outstanding teams.  Of course, from reading @tlas’ recap it looks like they have lit the fire under l@stplace and I’m willing to bet that we have not heard the l@st of them.  I do think, however, that this just means that the competetion is going to become stiffer each year that passes.  This will also put pressure on Kenshoto to keep coming up with outstanding and ground-breaking scenarios for these competitions.

One thing that did catch my eye while I was walking around DefCon was a flier for a $100,000 CTF in South Korea.  For some reason I cannot find the flier now but I guess it is similar to the April competition that was written up on The Dark Visitor back in March.  I have a feeling that we are going to see this turn into big competitions like we have seen with console gaming.  Imagine a circuit where you just do CTF for a living.  It seems like a good way to quickly base and build up your skills.  And, when all is said and done, back to the corporate world for damn fine consulting fees.  Well, we can all dream, right?!!!!

Go forth and do good things,

Don C. Weber

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