Cybersecurity Section

Run by Jefferson Ding


Welcome to the Cybersecurity section of the UCC Coding and Algorithms Academy. I am Jefferson Ding, a Grade 11 student at UCC.

Over the school year, I will be presenting a variety of cybersecurity challenges and issues. These challenges cover network attack and defences, radio hacking, CTF challenges and real-life issues. These questions require knowledge ranging from maths to overclocking the CPU, so you will most likely learn something new. CTF competitions are information security-focused challenges that various organizations host; our goal is to form a team of 5-10 players and compete against other teams.

Welcome to the Cybersecurity section of the UCC Coding and Algorithms Academy. I am Jefferson Ding, a Grade 11 student at UCC.

Over the school year, I will be presenting a variety of cybersecurity challenges and issues. These challenges cover network attack and defences, radio hacking, CTF challenges and real-life issues. These questions require knowledge ranging from maths to overclocking the CPU, so you will most likely learn something new. CTF competitions are information security-focused challenges that various organizations host; our goal is to form a team of 5-10 players and compete against other teams.


PicoCTF CanHack 2021


This year, our club sent two teams and one individual participant for the picoCTF CanHack, which is the largest cybersecurity hacking competition for middle and high school students. Our top performing team, led by Jefferson, placed 5th overall in Canada and 17th worldwide. This result is extraordinary - congratulations to all participants!

Jefferson has written writeups of his solutions to many of this year's picoCTF problems. You can find them here.


Resources for Club Members


Meeting Presentations

If a slideshow was used during a section meeting, it will be posted below after the meeting.

March 4, 2021 - picoCTF CanHack Information Session (Recording)

March 4, 2021 - picoCTF CanHack Information Session (Slideshow)

December 14, 2020 - Mr. Farahmand's Guest Speech Blockchain Presentation

October 1 and 16, 2020 - Introduction to CTF Competitions.

CTF Competitions

CTFtime UCC Team - Our UCC team for participating in CTFtime CTF competitions. Please contact Jefferson Ding for the invite code.

DMZ CanHack - The DMZ CanHack is the Canadian branch of the well-known PicoCTF cybersecurity competition by Carnegie Mellon University.

DMZ CanHack Resource Hub - Resources, including video tutorials, for the DMZ CanHack competition.

picoGym - Noncompetitive practice space including past picoCTF problems.

picoPrimer - More detailed introduction to specific CTF techniques and tools.

picoCTF Resources Homepage - Learning guides for cybersecurity concepts.

picoCTF 2021 Writeups - written by Jefferson.

Other Resources


Tools

CyberChef - Provides tools for decoding, hashing, and similar.

CTF Learning Resources

CTFlearn - Problem repository for practice.

John Hammond Youtube - Helpful CTF writeups and tutorials.

LiveOverflow Youtube - Helpful CTF writeups and tutorials.

Blockchain Learning Resources

Mr. Farahmand's Presentation - Mr. Farahmand's Presentation from the guest speaker event.

What is Ethereum? - Introduction to the Ethereum blockchain.

Ethereum Developer Resources? - Learn Ethereum development with documentation and tutorials.