Two talented students from Nayland College recently showcased their skills at the NZ Cyber Security Challenge 2024 in Hamilton, organised by the Department of Computer Science (University of Waikato) and the Cyber Security Researchers of Waikato (CROW).
Fionn Cassidy, a Year 12 student excelling in Computer Science, has a deep knowledge and interest in cybersecurity, networking, and programming. Ivan Shabashev, a passionate Year 10 student, is currently enrolled in a Computer Science and Robotics class, and is enthusiastic about digital technologies, cybersecurity, and programming.
Both students independently chose to enter the national New Zealand Cyber Security Challenge (NZCSC), alongside five other Nayland College students (Joel Batchelar, Jacob Cavers, Yanxuan Weng, Vincent Rodley and Max Lang).
NZCSC is an annual, multi-round competition that challenges the skills of industry professionals, tertiary students and high school students, in various branches of cyber security technologies such as cryptography, steganography, digital forensic science, incident response, and others.
The 2024 competition saw over 400 participants from across New Zealand enter the online qualifying round, which involved ‘capture-the-flag,’ a cyber security exercise consisting of multiple puzzles and challenges. Each puzzle had a ‘flag’ (usually a sequence of alphanumeric characters), hidden somewhere, and the challenge for participants was to find as many flags as they could.
Ivan achieved first place in the high school category and 17th place in the overall ranking that included industry professionals and tertiary students; an outstanding achievement for the 14 year old!
All seven Nayland College students secured positions in the top 20% during the qualifying round, earning places for the next two rounds at The University of Waikato in Hamilton on Saturday 13 July. However, only Fionn and Ivan were able to attend.
The top 150 challengers from the qualifying round, competed as teams of 1-3 in challenges that covered skills in two categories. Round one was about incident response and round two covered multiple cyber security technologies. Ivan described a couple of the challenges they faced saying, “One challenge involved cracking encrypted files and monitoring WiFi traffic, another challenge involved viewing security logs to trace a hacker’s steps.”
In round two, Ivan and Fionn, won first place in the high school category and achieved second place across all the three categories including industry professionals and tertiary students. What an incredible achievement for the duo! Their dedication and expertise distinguished them above expectations.
For Ivan, it was his first time taking part in the competition, so he felt “quite proud” of his results and he is definitely keen to enter again next year. Ivan has been keen on computer programming since his parents gave him a book when he was around eight years old. By the time he was twelve, he had discovered a passion to learn more about cyber security, and it is something he would like to pursue a career in. As Fionn is moving overseas next week, Ivan is hoping he can find another teammate for future competitions. In speaking about his Fionn, Ivan said, “He had a lot of perseverance; he found a single challenge and he stuck to it, and solved it before anyone else could, even the best team.”
If you would like to know more information about the competition, visit the NZCSC2024 website: https://cybersecuritychallenge.org.nz/
Congratulations Fionn and Ivan! We wish you both all the best for your future cyber security endeavours!
By Nayland College