Competition History and Basics
Brief History of CyberPatriot[edit | edit source]
"CyberPatriot is the National Youth Cyber Education Program created by the Air Force Association to inspire K-12 students toward careers in cybersecurity or other science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disciplines critical to our nation's future"
Originally started in 2009 the CyberPatriot program has always aimed to get the youth involved in the cybersecurity space. The first season there were only 8 teams and a single round with a single Windows XP image, the next year there were over 200 teams from 3 nations, this time with 3 qualification rounds and a championship; the latest season, season 13, had over 4,800 teams, 3 qualification rounds each with up to 5 images, and a national championship in Bethesda, Maryland!
How the Competition Works[edit | edit source]
"Images"[edit | edit source]
The Air Force Association (AFA) will distribute virtual machine disk files pre configured for competition, these are also referred to as "images"; these are loaded up using VMware. These images have a piece of software on them (CyberPatriot Competition System) that constantly checks for specific "flags" within the virtual machine. These flags can be anything from settings within an induvial application to the presence of presence some files! When the scoring software detects a flag it will award points that are then totaled with the rest of your teams points to get your teams score which is then used to rank teams and for advancement. More about the core mechanics of every image can be found here.
Packet Tracer[edit | edit source]
Packet Tracer is a tool made by Cisco that is used to simulate any sort of digital network; its primary use is for training students on the networking without any of the expensive equipment, it is also used by pros to diagram out networks to get feedback from others. Using it you can fully simulate a network; this is of particular use for CyberPatriot as they will build out a network then have you troubleshoot it, they then use the integrated scoring function to generate a final score which is then added to the team's total score.