The eCSI Hacker Playground is an online competition, available globally for penetration testers, IT security experts and all the candidates, who like challenging themselves and would like to learn more about exciting vulnerabilities based on real-life examples. Black Hat USA 2015 conference participants can receive on-site technical support at BalaBit booth #566 during the exhibition days, 5-6 August 2015 in Las Vegas.

You can register for the eCSI Hacker Playground competition until the end of the game (9 August 2015) individually. Employees of the organizers – BalaBit and Silent Signal – may also register for the competition but will not be awarded.

The competition starts July 31, 2015 at 12am Las Vegas time and ends August 9 at 12am Las Vegas time. All registered competitors will be informed via e-mail about the start, and other useful information will also be shared in e-mail as well. If organizers see the competitors need help for the next step, they will be informed via e-mail, too.

During the game (1-9 August 2015) registration is also accepted, your access code will be sent via email within 24 hours.

The game is simple:

1. Gain remote access to the target servers
2. Elevate your privileges
3. Submit user and administrative level proofs

There are four target machines with increasing difficulty to crack. You can decide in which order you'd like to solve them. Solutions don't require brute-force, you have to only use your brain to make progress. You can get points by submitting randomly generated proofs from the cracked machines. The first player who reaches the most points will win the game.

Another special price is offered for the Best Backdoor. You should implement a solution for persistent access to (at least) one of the targets and document what you did. The backdoor doesn’t have to survive VM reverts. The Best Backdoor writeup will be chosen by the organizers.

Finally, National Heroes – players who reach the highest score first in their county, will also be awarded with special prizes. Eligible countries for the National Hero Prize are: US, UK, Germany, France, Belgium, The Netherlands, Russia, Poland and Hungary. In other countries, the best player of the country will receive a “National Hero of the eCSI Hacker Playground” certificate.

Read more below How to get scores

During the contest you can contact the organizers for technical support at the ecsihackerplayground@silentsignal.eu e-mail address or in person at the BalaBit booth #566 at BlackHat USA.

You get scores by submitting proofs. Proofs can be read from the proof.txt files located under the home directories (on *nix) or on the Desktop (on Windows) of the corresponding users. User level proofs worth 100 points, administrative level proofs worth 200 points. You can follow the progress of the game on our Scoreboard.

Backdooor writeups should be sent in plain text of PDF format to ecsihackerplayground@silentsignal.eu until 16 August 12:00 am PT Las Vegas time so that you have a whole week after the game to complete your documentation.

It is also possibly illegal. This is especially true for the Scoreboard. You definitely don't want to waste your 0-days on us!

Don't attract unnecessary attention, work like a real BlackHat ;) Deliberate DoS attempts, ARP poisoning or deface will result in permanent ban.

Keep in mind that this is just a game. Be fair and don't obstruct the work of others. The targets are reverted periodically to their original state, so you won’t be able to cause much trouble anyway.

The eCSI Hacker Playground is designed for you. It’s not only a cool game where you can legally practice your existing hacking knowledge, it also helps you to develop your skills to protect your network against the latest threats. “Practice makes the master” – so be brave and try new methods.

We all work on to make the world a safer place. It is important to keep yourself up-to-date and participate in refreshing trainings. You never know when the world will need your help in the future.

Attend our free IT Security training series to became an eCSI Officer