Welcome to WarmupCTF
What is ethical hacking?
Ethical Hacking is an act of penetrating into system or networks to find out threats, vulnerabilities in those systems which a malicious attacker may find and exploit causing loss of data, financial loss or other major damages.
The purpose of ethical hacking is to improve the security of the network or systems by fixing the vulnerabilities found during testing.
Ethical hackers may use the same methods and tools used by the malicious hackers but with the explicit consent of the authorized person for the purpose of improving the security and defending the systems from attacks by malicious users.
In this Capture The Flag you have our explicit consent to attack the systems linked as a challenge on the challenge board.
What's a Capture The Flag?
What's a Capture The Flag you might ask?
Well it's an ethical hacking competition, where the team who can figure a way into the most systems or solve the most problems earns the most points. And the person with the most points is the winner!
Do I have to do any running?
Only if you want to!
The kind of flags you capture in a CTF (that's what we call them), are digital. That means you'll find them on your computer or some other electronic device!
Different CTF competitions use different flag formats but they will generally be denoted by one of the following three:
flag{this_is_a_flag}
flag{thisisaflag}
flag{thisIsAFlag}
Use the knowledge of this format to your advantage, particularly noting that all flags start with the same five characters.
You may have to do lots of reading and sometimes a little bit of guessing about what to do but you can always ask your mentor for suggestions about what to do. And be sure to read the Rules & Recommendations.
You can read more about the different kinds of CTFs here.
Why are you referring to attack, bomb, and exploitation?
Common CTF competitions scenarios include words such as "attack", "bomb", and "exploitation" which are used to describes cyber threats and the tactics to guard against them.
While this language and terminology is not generally used in a school or classroom setting, it is appropriate for a CTF competition as it reflects what is used in the cybersecurity industry.