The third edition of the Digital Pakistan Cybersecurity Hackathon 2023, organized by Ignite, has been launched in Karachi. The event will feature regional rounds in Lahore, Multan, Peshawar, Quetta, and Islamabad, culminating in a final competition to be held in Islamabad by the end of December.

The hackathon aims to identify and nurture talent capable of thwarting malicious cyber attempts and to promote secure coding practices. Participants will compete in a series of challenges designed to test their skills in areas such as penetration testing, web application security, network security, and incident response.

Caretaker Federal Minister for Information Technology and Telecom Dr. Umar Saif emphasized the importance of safeguarding the country’s cyber boundaries and highlighted the ongoing efforts to establish a Cyber Security Authority.

Ignite CEO Asim Shahryar Husain said that the hackathon is part of a series of initiatives aimed at building cybersecurity capacity in Pakistan. He also noted that three teams from previous Ignite hackathons competed in Black Hat MEA in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and achieved impressive results.

The hackathon kicked off with a quiz competition followed by a blue teaming exercise and a capture the flag style competition. The top three teams were Revolt, M4Lware, and Sigma4.