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OpenHack Contest Evaluation: Insights On Previous Critiques And Claims

Calendar Jul 06, 2000 • User Avatar Anthony Pell
1 - 2 min read
General Esm H446
Topics%20covered

Topics Covered

network security security assessment contest evaluation open hack project Linux critique
The recent ZDNet OpenHack project claims to "Openhack data will help e-businesses develop the appropriate balance of Net security, openness". Jericho from attrition.org has a different view. "Does this bring flashbacks of any previous contest? Does for me. I seem to recall the same group running a contest like this before. I also recall the previous contest being extremely unbalanced, poorly setup, and very unclear as to the actual goal of it.

Last time, the same group put a heavily secured Windows NT box up against a near default install Red Hat Linux box, and tried to claim Linux was less secure after it was hacked. Rather than change the default install of the linux machine by adding security patches, they added insecure third party CGI software that later proved to be the achilles hill of the Linux system. This was far from a fair contest. But wait.. they don't mention this at all."

 The recent ZDNet OpenHack project claims to "Openhack data will help e-businesses develop the appropriate balance of Net security, openness". Jericho from attrition.org has a different view. "Does this bring flashbacks of any previous contest? Does for me. I seem to recall the same group running a contest like this before. I also recall the previous contest being extremely unbalanced, poorly setup, and very unclear as to the actual goal of it.. . .