Capture the Flag events come in a variety of different shapes and sizes. It’s difficult to place what a CTF is in a single box, but essentially it’s a competition to gain points by solving puzzles and challenges. These puzzles and challenges can vary in time and difficulty to complete, and once completed the player is assigned points based on the difficulty of the challenge, the player with the highest score is the winner. Below are two examples of CTF challenges:
- A traditional easy challenge – Text that can be deciphered using the right tool, in this case, ROT13
- Challenge – Grnz Fcnegn
- Answer – Team Sparta
- Points – 5
- A traditional moderate challenge – An NT password hash that would need to be recovered/solved
- Challenge – FB71A8C273CD24C86C936B5504801357
- Answer –
- Points – 10
These type of challenges are known as Jeopardy style CTF questions, where participants pick puzzles to solve and provide answers to score points. This is by far the most popular CTF style, however others exist such as King of the Hill or “Mixed”. Each CTF style has it’s pros and cons, with Jeopardy being the most beginner friendly.
- King of the hill
- Goal: Maintain control of systems longer than anyone else
- Mixed
- Goal: Solve the most challenges and hack the most systems
- Attack/Defend
- Goal: Hack the opponents network and defend your own network from the opponent
- Jeopardy
- Goal: Solve the most challenges
There are additional styles of CTF, but these are popular options.
CTFs originated from the Las Vegas DEF CON conference in 1996, since then CTFs have grown and changed over the years, however Defcon is still a significant CTF event. In 2004 DEF CON created system for local groups to meet throughout the year, expanding the DEF CON hacker culture. Today, I’m part of my local DEF CON group, DC864, where I help lead and help admin CTF events for local conferences. This past year, we hosted CTFs for three conferences, including BSides Greenville 2025 where HighPoint sponsored prizes for the top three winners.
HighPoint gives back to the community by sponsoring CTF events and supporting their employee’s contributions to events. By supporting CTFs, HighPoint is investing in relationships with new and current Cybersecurity professionals, giving them the opportunity to test their skills and learn new ones, all while keeping things fun. I became a penetration tester because of a CTF, HighPoint’s support helps me provide that same opportunity to my local community that I received from a CTF in 2019.
Wrapping it all up, CTFs provide multiple benefits from practicing skills to learning new ones. HighPoint’s commitment to CTFs helps provide these opportunities to students and seasoned professionals, encouraging relentless improvement and serving the Cybersecurity community. If you’d like to learn more about what HighPoint can do to help your Cybersecurity or how you might implement your own CTF, please reach out, we’d love to talk.
HighPoint’s Fundamentals illustrated here:
#12 Invest in relationships
#13 Be relentless about continuous improvement
#32 Serve one another
#33 Keep things fun
