2024 Holiday Hack Challenge Intro

The Zen Tester -

The holidays are fast approaching. Yes, it's November, but Christmas decorations have been in stores for over a month (lookin at you Costco...). Most importantly, the 2024 Holiday Hack Challenge (HHC) is ramping up! There are a few changes this year which I'll touch on.

New Format - Rolling Challenges!

In past years, access to all of the challenges were available once the CTF began, and you completed the necessary challenges. This year - there will be rolling access to the challenges through 4 dates, spanning a prologue, and 3 Acts:

  • Prologue - November 7th, 2024
  • Act 1 - November 11th, 2024
  • Act 2 - November 18th, 2024
  • Act 3 - December 2nd, 2024

In addition to the challenges being rolled out in waves, you'll be able to skip challenges! This could help if you've spent hours/days trying a challenge that isn't within your wheelhouse.

Share Solutions

Probably the coolest portion of the new format - is the ability to post solutions one week after each section's release. I know in the past I've struggled to document my writeups in an offline format (i.e. Obsidian) but then translate it to a blog post later on. This makes it a bit easier to build the blog posts as you're doing the challenges.

Submit for Swag

As in previous years, don't forget to submit your writeup to SANS for a chance for a subscription to Netwars Continuous for 4 months, or a SANS OnDemand Training Course.

Scoreboards and Cohorts

There will be a live scoreboard for all players, and the ability to have "cohorts" or a leaderboard for your group of sriends to help some holiday competition to motivate folks to participate. Below are the categories for submitting your report:

  1. One random draw answer whose user has clicked on each of the five vendor booths (Google, Microsoft, RSAC, SANS.edu, and Holiday Hack Swag Store):
    1. HOLIDAY HACK CHALLENGE T-SHIRT
  2. The best technical answer:
    1. ONE SUBSCRIPTION TO NETWARS CONTINUOUS for FOUR MONTHS
  3. The most creative (while technically correct) answer:
    1. ONE SUBSCRIPTION TO NETWARS CONTINUOUS for FOUR MONTHS
  4. The best overall answer, our GRAND PRIZE WINNER:
    1. ONE SANS ONDEMAND TRAINING COURSE

All you have to do is submit your report to the Google Form on the SANS website, or e-mail it to SANSHolidayHackChallenge@counterhack.com.

Skill Levels

There are now going to be "easy" and "hard" modes for each challenge. You can choose either mode to solve the challenge.

Learn More

To learn more, visit the SANS website. The prologue will be happening in a few days! so get excited!

Past Posts

For an introduction to what HHC is - check out some of my older posts.

The primer on HHC as well as links to all of the 2022 walkthroughs.

2022 Holiday Hack Challenge!
It’s that time of year - the Holiday Hack Challenge is upon us! For the the uninitiated, it’s an annual SANS’ annual free CTF, that is fun for all skill levels. Below are some tips on how to sign up, as well as words of encouragement if you’re hesitating at
The ZenTesterThe Zen Tester

Last year's challenges, all in one post.