Teams comprised of up to three high school students are invited to participate in a round of challenges designed to test their knowledge of cybersecurity, computer science and information technology.
The only requirements are an interest in cybersecurity and a familiarity with computers. This is a great cybersecurity learning opportunity for all high school students in Michigan.
All schools in Michigan are invited to participate and the challenge is entirely FREE!
Round 0 is an unscored round consisting of resources, found below, to prepare you for the Round 1 and Round 2 challenges. These online resources can be utilized by parents, instructors, and administrators as cybersecurity warm-ups, supplements to curriculum, and more.
Round 0 study resources are available throughout the entire competition. You may come back and review these materials at any time.
Round 1 will be held entirely online! The challenges will be released daily starting Monday, September 27th, and ends Thursday, September 30th . The top 10 qualifying teams will be announced Friday, October 1st. Students have between 9:00 A.M. – 6:00 P.M. ET each day to answer the set of multiple choice questions. The daily challenges will focus on networks, programming, operating systems and hacking. Round 1 is a timed open style challenge in which students are encouraged to scour the internet to solve the challenges. The top ten teams will be selected to advance to Round 2.
Round 2 is an exercise in gamified learning. An adult chaperone must be the point of contact between Merit and the teams at all times. During Round 2, teams will compete in a virtual Capture the Flag exercise designed to test their skills with an intensive, scored series of cybersecurity-focused challenges taking place in the virtual city of Alphaville. In this round, students can compare progress with one another on a virtual scoreboard.
Round 2 will take place virtually on October 8, 2021, 9 A.M. – 3 P.M. ET.
- Only teachers, coaches or chaperones may register teams for the GHSCC.
- Teams will be composed of 1-3 students and one adult coach.
- Schools and coaches are encouraged to have multiple teams, however each student may only participate on a single cyber challenge team.
- Substitutions of players is acceptable. If team count is changed you must notify [email protected].
- Round 1 is held entirely online and will be scored by staff of the Michigan Cyber Range.
- Round 2 will be held entirely online.
- Round 1 and Round 2 are timed challenges.
- In the event of a tie during Round 1, completion times will be considered and reviewed by the Michigan Cyber Range.
- In the event of a tie during Round 2, the team with the most flags will be determined the winner.
Collaboration between teams is strictly prohibited. We want to ensure that all participants have an equal opportunity to advance to Round 2, and as such, any activity found to be against the rules or sense of fair play is grounds for disqualification at the sole discretion of Merit Network.
The GHSCC aims to expose students to cybersecurity at no cost to the students or schools. Round 2 participants will be given access to a number of free pre-certification training courses over a variety of cybersecurity and networking topics. Round 2 participants also compete for prizes and a chance at the first place trophy.
GHSCC OVERVIEW
No registration required. Round 0 consists of reviewing study materials in preparation for the Round 0 Challenges.
- Cybersecurity
- Cisco Networking Academy – Intro to Cybersecurity – Great resource to start with!
- SANS Ultimate List of Cheat Sheets
- Programming(PowerShell, Bash)
- Networking (DHCP service, tracert, nslookup, route, firewall)
- Windows Admin
- Linux
- Database Admin
- Recon (Whois)
Linux
- Cisco Networking Academy – Linux Essentials – Knowing Linux will be essential!
Challenge Tracks
- GIT Track
- Find PII (Library, SQL Database vulnerabilities, SSH, Service Discovery)
- School (OpenSSL, Encryption, Windows Exploitation, Reverse Engineering)
- Deface the Website (Cityhall, PHP, SSH Brute Force)
- Are you SCADA the dark (SSH, Python)
- Zenda (Incident Response & Forensics, Malware, Windows)
- Linux 101/102
- Python 101
- Reconnaissance 101
- Powershell 101/102
- Networking 101
- Cryptography 101
- Binary Forensics 101
- Digital Forensics
Round One will consist of four multiple-choice quizzes. Each day’s set of questions is preceded by a story, which sets the context for the questions to follow. Topics covered in the quiz include knowledge about the following topics: Linux command line, Window administration, networking, reconnaissance, database administration, securing systems, and programming tasks on various operating systems.
Capture the Flag is a learning tool designed to take the stress out of the daunting task of learning cyber security concepts and turning it into a fun, self-paced game. CTF is a means to assess and gain individual skills across a broad range of systems and challenges. Participants traverse through challenges in the game environment using penetration testing and forensic skills to find flags and earn points. They will use the open source tool available on their Kali Linux Virtual Machine to complete the challenges given to them. Each challenge track is built around a specific security skillset, such as website vulnerability exploitation, SQL injection, and cracking weak passwords.
