1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:08,640 ...top cybersecurity talent to develop the skills necessary to secure this last frontier of cybersecurity, space. 2 00:00:08,640 --> 00:00:11,660 And already we've made a ton of progress. 3 00:00:11,660 --> 00:00:13,000 I'll catch you up. 4 00:00:13,000 --> 00:00:22,800 This spring we hosted over 2,000 teams who worked their way through a set of foundational space cybersecurity challenges in our HackASAT qualification round. 5 00:00:22,800 --> 00:00:26,580 Now eight finalist teams are stepping up to the ultimate challenge. 6 00:00:27,200 --> 00:00:30,280 They are hacking a satellite. 7 00:00:37,750 --> 00:00:41,630 Welcome to Space Security Challenge 2020, or HackASAT. 8 00:00:41,630 --> 00:00:45,550 I'm your host, Jordan Wines, and I'm very excited to be with you today. 9 00:00:45,550 --> 00:00:59,150 I'm here in Melbourne, Florida, at HackASAT HQ, where eight satellites are spinning out of control as the teams do their best to restore functionality, all for a piece of a $100,000 prize pool. 10 00:00:59,150 --> 00:01:13,730 These teams from 11 different countries around the world include not only some that are very familiar to those of us from the Capture the Flag, or CTF, community, but also include many newcomers who assembled just to answer the call for HackASAT. 11 00:01:13,730 --> 00:01:15,170 Let's meet our teams. 12 00:01:56,310 --> 00:02:04,590 To get to this final event, individuals on these eight teams had to beat out over 6,000 other competitors for a coveted invitation. 13 00:02:04,590 --> 00:02:20,770 This required mastery not only in traditional CTF hacking skills, like reverse engineering and vulnerability research, but also in areas new to the CTF community, including orbital mechanics, astrophysics, space-based communication systems, and many others. 14 00:02:20,770 --> 00:02:29,310 Today and tomorrow, each of our eight teams will race the others through a series of challenges to regain control over their Flatsat. 15 00:02:29,310 --> 00:02:48,110 If you followed our story at hackasat.com and launch.com.com, you might know that through some bad code and poor business choices, our defunct launch.com company has accidentally triggered a satellite intended for the year 2000 to be launched in 2020 with no one in control. 16 00:02:48,110 --> 00:02:56,890 In our fictional storyline, this satellite has been co-opted by nefarious forces, and it's up to our competitors to regain control over the many components. 17 00:02:56,930 --> 00:03:10,510 Since qualifying, each team was shipped a physical Flatsat, and these Flatsats are not only prizes for their qualifying performance, but also allow the teams to become familiar with the hardware and software before this final event. 18 00:03:10,510 --> 00:03:13,530 So what's the difference between a satellite and a Flatsat? 19 00:03:13,530 --> 00:03:22,250 Think of a Flatsat as a bench version for testing components of an actual satellite without necessarily being exactly what you would send into space. 20 00:03:22,250 --> 00:03:31,130 The satellites you can watch in our live webcams are Flatsats, but don't worry, not all of the competition this weekend will be terrestrial. 21 00:03:31,410 --> 00:03:41,530 The game has actually been underway for one hour now, and our team's first challenge has been to regain control of the ground station that they'll be using to communicate with their Flatsats. 22 00:03:41,530 --> 00:03:45,410 Being good hackers, of course, we call this Challenge Zero. 23 00:03:46,190 --> 00:03:47,750 Challenge Zero. 24 00:03:48,570 --> 00:03:49,990 Here's what we know. 25 00:03:49,990 --> 00:03:53,810 An adversary has obtained access to the satellite's ground station. 26 00:03:53,810 --> 00:03:56,830 Once they obtained access, they kicked us out. 27 00:03:57,050 --> 00:03:58,130 The challenge? 28 00:03:58,130 --> 00:04:01,470 Teams must obtain network access to the ground station. 29 00:04:08,380 --> 00:04:13,420 This is called Challenge Zero because it's required for the teams to even kick the game off. 30 00:04:14,220 --> 00:04:26,280 While most of our challenges will have teams focusing on components that are inside of their Flatsats, Challenge Zero is all about gaining access to the ground station that they'll be using to communicate with their Flatsat. 31 00:04:26,380 --> 00:04:28,040 And again, this is not a simulation . 32 00:04:28,040 --> 00:04:37,800 All of these eight Flatsats may be here on Earth, but they're completely untethered, floating on a cushion of air, and each one being connected wirelessly from a separate radio link. 33 00:04:37,800 --> 00:04:43,800 In the first hour of gameplay, teams have been getting their bearings and working on solving Challenge Zero. 34 00:04:43,800 --> 00:04:51,360 In fact, just before this broadcast went live, we received word that this challenge was actually solved by Team Samurai. 35 00:04:51,420 --> 00:04:53,060 Congratulations to them. 36 00:04:53,060 --> 00:04:56,760 Let's go ahead and see a little bit more about Team Samurai. 37 00:05:26,100 --> 00:05:29,260 Team Samurai is a mainstay in the CTF community. 38 00:05:29,260 --> 00:05:36,400 In fact, one of the fun facts about this community is that I've competed against Samurai about as many times as I've actually competed with them. 39 00:05:36,400 --> 00:05:43,380 This community is tight-knit, people move around between them, and it's good to see them jump into the lead and take a start on the scoreboard. 40 00:05:43,460 --> 00:05:49,440 They're now going to be focusing on Challenge One, which we're going to give you a little bit of a hint on what that entails now. 41 00:05:51,240 --> 00:05:52,880 Challenge Number One. 42 00:05:53,080 --> 00:05:54,300 Here's what we know. 43 00:05:54,300 --> 00:06:01,840 Having access to the ground station means we can attempt communication, but the satellite is spinning out of control, which complicates everything. 44 00:06:02,040 --> 00:06:02,960 The challenge. 45 00:06:02,960 --> 00:06:05,940 Teams must regain communication with the satellite. 46 00:06:16,240 --> 00:06:29,360 While this event was originally planned to be in person during DEF CON in the Aerospace Village, thanks to the tireless efforts of dozens of people involved behind the scenes, we're instead streaming to you live throughout the event. 47 00:06:29,380 --> 00:06:38,080 Not only has the game itself been adapted to allow for remote participation from our eight teams over VPN, but the spectator experience has changed as well. 48 00:06:38,080 --> 00:06:41,820 There are many different ways you can now experience HackASAT. 49 00:06:41,820 --> 00:06:51,580 For a simpler interface, just visit hackasat.com, with a web-based scoreboard, these periodic live updates streamed right and center, and links to other resources. 50 00:06:51,580 --> 00:07:06,640 For a more immersive experience, head over to virtual.hackasat.com, where you can get all of the above and more, including watching our satellites live via one of four dedicated webcam feeds, get more technical game data from the 3D octagon scoreboard, 51 00:07:06,640 --> 00:07:17,160 as well as many other resources about our competitors, the flatsats, the technologies involved in space, and even communicate with other viewers in a dedicated chat and have a few social interactions. 52 00:07:17,340 --> 00:07:19,460 No need to remember all that just now though. 53 00:07:19,460 --> 00:07:25,760 All you have to remember is that you can find it all on hackasat.com and virtual.hackasat.com. 54 00:07:25,820 --> 00:07:33,060 The HackASAT team is also partnering with the Aerospace Village, one of the many villages you'd normally get to experience in person at DEFCON. 55 00:07:33,060 --> 00:07:39,820 After 15 years of attendance, I know I'm not the only one missing many of my friends and our hallway conversations at DEFCON. 56 00:07:40,020 --> 00:07:43,480 Hopefully we can recreate a little bit of that experience here. 57 00:07:43,860 --> 00:08:00,560 In addition to all that we have going on at HackASAT, make sure you check out the rest of what DEFCON, the Aerospace Village, and our friends over at Defense Digital Service are doing this weekend, and hope to see you back here as we check in on how our teams are doing and hear more about the vision behind HackASAT at our next update at 11 a.m. 58 00:08:00,560 --> 00:08:01,760 Pacific, 2 p.m. 59 00:08:01,760 --> 00:08:02,440 Eastern.