{"id":214983,"date":"2025-05-02T10:34:37","date_gmt":"2025-05-02T20:34:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=214983"},"modified":"2025-05-02T19:08:33","modified_gmt":"2025-05-03T05:08:33","slug":"def-con-ctf","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2025\/05\/02\/def-con-ctf\/","title":{"rendered":"Cybersecurity team prepares for final DEF<\/abbr> CON<\/abbr> battle"},"content":{"rendered":"Reading time: <\/span> < 1<\/span> minute<\/span><\/span>
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From left, Juliette Raubolt, Ethan Morrell, Zion Leonahenahe Basque and Nathan Wong<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Three University of Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> at M\u0101noa students have advanced to the finals of one of the most prestigious cybersecurity competitions in the world—DEF<\/abbr> CON<\/abbr> CTF<\/abbr> (Capture the Flag)—after placing fifth in the global qualifying round<\/a> held online in April.<\/p>\n

The students—Ethan Morrell, Juliette Raubolt and Nathan Wong—are computer science majors in the Department of Information and Computer Sciences<\/a> in the College of Natural Sciences<\/a> and members of Grey Hats, a UH<\/abbr> M\u0101noa cybersecurity club.<\/p>\n

They joined forces with Shellphish, a veteran team, to compete in the DEF<\/abbr> CON<\/abbr> CTF<\/abbr> qualifier, an intense 48-hour event that drew nearly 200 top-tier teams from around the world. The competition challenged participants to solve complex puzzles in reverse engineering, hacking and digital forensics—all part of the real-world skillset used by cybersecurity professionals to detect vulnerabilities, protect data and respond to cyber threats.<\/p>\n

“This experience has been invaluable in applying what we\u2019ve learned in class to real-world challenges,” Morrell said. “I am grateful to have been part of such an amazing team.”<\/p>\n

Now, they\u2019re preparing for the DEF<\/abbr> CON<\/abbr> finals in August, where the top eight teams will face off in a live, head-to-head showdown in Las Vegas. Unlike the qualifier\u2019s “Jeopardy-style” format, the finals require teams to simultaneously defend their systems while launching attacks against others—closely simulating the kind of adversarial scenarios cybersecurity experts face in high-stakes environments.<\/p>\n

For the UH<\/abbr> students, this experience goes beyond bragging rights. It\u2019s a rare, hands-on opportunity to apply classroom theory in one of the most demanding real-world settings, opening doors to competitive careers in national security, tech and beyond.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The team is preparing for the DEF<\/abbr> CON<\/abbr> finals in August, where the top eight teams will face off in a live, head-to-head showdown in Las Vegas.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":214984,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[308,541,484,1466,568,313,660,9],"class_list":["post-214983","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-people","tag-college-of-natural-sciences","tag-computer-science","tag-information-and-computer-science","tag-manoa-enhancing-student-success","tag-natural-science","tag-stem","tag-student-recognition","tag-uh-manoa","entry","has-media"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/manoa-ics-def-con-team.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214983","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=214983"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214983\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":214987,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214983\/revisions\/214987"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/214984"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=214983"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=214983"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=214983"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}