This week, we bring you another guest post from our players. This time, the great and powerful Wasabi shares his experience about winning at BsidesDE...
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{
So BSIDES DE is the first stop for the new version of the WCTF
after it gets a makeover that starts at DEFCON. There is some tough competition at BSIDES DC
so I wanted to get a leg up and get a sneak peek at the challenges. So I made the short trip up from Maryland and
had a great time. It was my first time
going to BSIDES Delaware I really enjoyed the small laid back feeling of the
conference. My team and I thought the
trip was a great idea after seeing the DEFCON in-brief and looking at the new
challenges. It became clear I need to
step my game up after many things that stumped me like a chump that I will be
preparing to beat at the next WCTF. They
are now doing Individual scores as the overall winner. No teams for now, they are trying this out
for a while to see how it goes. There
was no Hide and Seek or Foxes at this conference the square footage did not
allow for proper hiding and difficulty.
Friday
First I was a speaker at the convention giving a talk on
competing in the WCTF. And even though I
was full of good advice I could not even get out of my own way. I failed to test my gear, I had been using
Pentoo for an SDR class I was taking. I
had issues with installing standard and hardened and finally got the dev build
to install. Well at least is was not the
night before right. I even ran BT and
used blue_hydra. But not once did I try
anything with Wifi. Guess where the
problem was. I bet you can't guess. Ok maybe you can.
Well there is a bug that kernel panics your system when you put
your wifi card into monitor mode. Go
figure it literally does this on every single computer in the world except for
Zero’s. So now I’m sitting here at my
table having to download an older version of Pentoo to live boot for the
competition. People stopped by to see
things after my talk and all they saw was me struggling to get started. Times ticking and I haven't even started yet.
After flying disks, plenty of “EXTREMELY” encouraging help, and
giving up on installs and just going with a live boot I was up and going. So now some time after 2pm I was rocking and
rolling starting on the Wifi Challenges.
I turned in 5 flags for Wifi and got hung up on the last few. They had been created in such a way that
normal scans were not effective in discovering their secrets. They were just a little out of my scope for
now.
There were a few people that came and went that saw my talk
some stayed and played. The CyberRedneck
was a very cool guy who also had the hunger for flags and points and I helped
him along the way for his first WCTF. He
got third place at his first WCTF. I
might have created a monster.
Saturday
We got in nice and early
to get a start on the game enjoying bagels and coffee. I switched to SDR to try out a few
things. To say I was frustrated was an
understatement. These guys are
creative. Some things are staring you
right in the face and you couldn't even tell.
Other times you think you have it and it's a false flag. Things got a little more serious as more
people started to play on Saturday. So
there was definitely a change in pace and stress as I saw another person start
to rise up the point list.
So I fell back to Wifi as my strong suite. The last few challenges were epic to say the
least. After digging through pcaps and a
little assistance from Zero he said they may be a little harder than
anticipated. So again I am now
scrambling on SDR to get some more points.
I was able to get one flag begrudgingly after having to install more
apps on my phone to figure it out because GQRX was not showing me what I
needed. I am still haunted by the
music. Who even does AOL dial up
Dubstep? Why is that even a thing? I tried for one last flag as time was running
out. But as always I fell into the
category of it will not work for me the first time. I was having software issues and codex
problems that had everyone's head scratching.
In the end I was able to hold out and made top score. I had a great time. I met some new people. Learned some new things. I even met a former San Antonio Spurs
player. BSIDES DE is now a permanent
conference on my calendar. Thank you to
the WCTF crew, the BSIDES DE crew, and the
Sponsors.
}
We would like to sincerely thank Wasabi for his great write-up of the BSides experience. We run this game to provide a safe space to practice and test your skills, but above all we do it to share our passion with others. As Wasabi mentioned above regarding CyberRedNeck, the WCTF is a great place to pass on your knowledge and experience and make new friends. We sincerely hope the Wireless Village's efforts help keep your interest fired up and maybe ignites a new love in first time attendees and contestants. Many previous winners, near winners, and people who play have stories just like this. Please, come in, sit down, play, make friends, and join a welcoming group of your new friends.
Many thanks to our AWESOME sponsors whose generous donations sweeten the pot for our contestants.
-The Wireless Village and Wireless CTF Team
