Dal computer science students hack their way to national competition – Dal News

Four hours: That’s how long students had to penetrate the corporation’s network and expose its vulnerabilities.

While the network under attack during the CyberSci Regional Challenge was fictional, the skills on display by Singularity and Aurora — two four-person Dal teams — were very real. 

Singularity scooped up top spot in Atlantic Canada for its performance in the annual hacking competition held in New Brunswick last fall. In doing so, the students also landed a spot in national competition this coming summer by ranking fourth overall nationally against other teams competing in similar regional challenges. Aurora ranked fifth nationally.

For Singularity, it means competing again this July. Being ranked fourth nationally was fulfilling for the entire team but it meant a great deal for PhD student Rafael Copstein, Singularity’s team lead, who has recently secured a teaching position within the Faculty of Computer Science.

“Seeing us ranked fourth nationally was very rewarding for me,” he says. “Especially considering that I am now teaching a focused course on the subject, I feel qualified to guide our students into better results in these kinds of challenges.”

Unlocking potential

The competition is meant to challenge students and push them to their full potential all while creating networking and career opportunities.

Singularity, Aurora and the other teams competing were presented with a realistic corporate network that forced them to think about how an attacker would approach entry into the system. Students were faced with multiple problems of varying difficulties. Each competitive event tested the students for problem-solving, communication, creativity, and teamwork.

“We started by tackling some of the problems that were worth less points, hoping they would be easier to solve,” explains Rafael. “Some of the harder problems required more attention and more time, so we would put a single member to work on those while the others continued to analyze and discuss the other problems.”

Undergraduate student Logan MacDougall of Aurora echoes this: “Our team made sure to take full advantage of the tools we learned from our sessions. We would each tackle…