DEF CON 26 (2018) was the source of many headlines, including Hacking the US Midterms? It’s Child’s play., Hacking Medical Protocols to Change Vital Signs, and, Tesla Plans to Open-source its Vehicle Security Software, to say nothing of zero-day bugs and new attacks on old ones.
The most encouraging news, at least for transparency of corporations and governments comes from Breaking Badge – The DEFCON Crazy 8s by NodyaH.
“DEF CON City” is the location of a text-based adventure that can be solved only with interactions between 8 card types (depends on type of attendee) as well as hacking the cards themselves. The goal is to turn all the letters DEFCON green. There are resources at the end of the post, if you already have a badge.
NodyaH does a great job describing the starts, stops and re-tracing steps of participants as they rushed to break the badges.
It’s a fast moving tale so take a few minutes to read it. After having read it, can you name a corporate or governmental agency that would be more difficult to hack than the DEFCON badges?
The solution to grudging transparency and documents that mis-led more than they inform, is not more FOIA. Transparency requires hackers who peel corporate and government agencies like navel oranges.
Are you one of them or aspire to be?
Keep up with DEFCON!