Competition details

CyberTaipan is a fun competition that brings together people with different skills from diverse backgrounds. There are a few rules that teams must follow:

• The competition is played by teams of two to five students, with an optional reserve player.
• Each team must include a responsible adult (Team Coach) as the primary contact between the CyberTaipan Program Office and the participants. See requirements below for more details.
• Every team participant must be aged 12-18 years during the entirety of the competition (until March 2021).
• CyberTaipan is closed to university teams. Cyber Security Challenge Australia (CysCA) offers alternative competitions for university students.
• While the 2018-19 pilot was initially launched in the Australian Capital Territory and Victoria, anyone in the Australia that meets the age requirements and has the correct team format is welcome to participate. It is free to register for the training rounds and get a feel for the competition. Teams wishing to compete in the scored rounds will need to pay a fee of AUD$200 per team. This fee covers the costs of a participants pack for all competitors.

How does the competition work?

Each team must play a series of online qualifying rounds, which will challenge them to learn about networking, cyber defence and cyber security. If the team scores higher than most of the other competing teams on the leader board, then they will be invited to play in the National Finals, a face-to-face competition which determines the ultimate champion team for the year.

All rounds of competition in CyberTaipan, with the exception of the National Finals Competition, take place online. Teams may compete from any location; many participate at their school, organisation, or public library. Competitions take place at specified times throughout the school year. Teams must complete all their work during one six consecutive-hour period on the scheduled days of the competition window. They may only have one instance of an image open at a time. 

Team organisation

CyberTaipan teams consist of the following team members: 

Team Coach

CyberTaipan Coaches are the backbone of the competition. CyberTaipan requires an adult to register as a team Coach before any students are permitted to register or compete. Coaches are employees or officially affiliated adults approved by a participating school or educational organisation to act as the administrative lead of a CyberTaipan team. Having one, and only one, adult Coach of record for each team is a non-negotiable requirement.

Coaches DO NOT need to be technically savvy, as teams are welcome to work with Technical Mentors as described below, but all Coaches are responsible for the following: 

• Ensuring competitor safety by controlling access to minors, following legal and school requirements, and adequately supervising students during practice rounds and all rounds of competition.
• Protecting the competitions integrity by ensuring students receive no assistance from Mentors, Team Assistants, or anyone else during competition rounds. Coaches are also responsible for upholding the rules, time limits, and download limits as outlined in the CyberTaipan Rulebook.
• Acting as the CyberTaipan Program Office’s main point of contact for the team. Preparation emails for each round of competition, as well as the links to download competition images, are only sent to Coaches. The role of official point of contact may not be delegated to a Technical Mentor. Additionally, should we need to contact a team about score discrepancies, registration issues, or any other competition matters, we will use the information on file for the team’s Coach. All CyberTaipan Coaches should therefore ensure that they are capable of receiving messages from cybertaipan@csiro.au, which may be blocked by school firewalls.

Competitors

Each CyberTaipan team must consist of between two and six competitors enrolled in the participating school, organisation or community group. While up to six students are permitted on each team’s roster, a maximum of five students are permitted to compete at any one time during a competition round. The competitor not competing may act as a substitute, and cannot assist the active competitors. 

A Competitor shall compete on only one team during a CyberTaipan season. To be a Competitor, students must be over the age of 12 and under the age of 18 on or before the registration deadline.

Technical Mentor(s)

Technical Mentors are IT-experienced individuals who volunteer their time to teach cyber defence skills and cyber ethics to CyberTaipan teams. All Mentors are required to register on the CyberTaipan website and successfully complete a Working with Vulnerable People check before being added to the list of approved Mentors (Minimum age: 18).

Mentors must not teach hacking skills or offensive cyber tactics to Competitors, and meet with a team only with the Coach’s approval. One or more registered Mentors may be chosen by a Coach to assist in training his or her CyberTaipan team(s). Teams are not required to have a Technical Mentor. CyberTaipan Technical Mentors are welcome to assist multiple teams. There is no minimum time commitment for Technical Mentors. For example, a Technical Mentor can volunteer on a guest lecture basis or commit to training a team throughout the competition season. Suggested responsibilities include the following:

• Advising the Team Coach on skills
• Developing, with the Team Coach’s guidance, a plan to teach cyber defence skills
• Teaching and assisting Competitors with cyber defence skills and

Team Assistant(s)

Team Assistants are adult volunteers who provide non-technical support and encouragement to the team, such as assisting with scheduling, set-up, snacks, and transportation. Team Assistants are required to register on the CyberTaipan website and successfully complete a Working with Vulnerable People check before being added to the list of approved Assistants.

Before the round

• Train: Teams should start training for the competition as soon as they can before the first round. Teams should rely on their Technical Mentors to receive more advanced training. Archived training materials are available on the public site of the CyberPatriot website. Additional materials for the CyberTaipan competition will be made available to Team Coaches directly.
• Prepare: All teams should make sure that they have the hardware, software, and network capabilities required to compete successfully. As the goal of the program is to have as many teams as possible competing, technical requirements are kept to a minimum. Technical specifications can be found below.
• Download: About a week before the competition begins, the CyberTaipan Program Office sends an email with round instructions and links to download the virtual machine images (operating systems that can be played on top of other operating systems). These files are very large and should be downloaded well before a team is ready to compete. Teams also verify that their download was successful before the round begins. There will usually be two or three images per round.

During the round

• Extract: In the morning of the competition window period, teams receive an email with the password to extract the virtual machine images from their downloads. After doing so, they can load the images in VMware Player and begin competing.
• Identify: When the images are opened, teams are prompted to enter a Team ID. This is a 10-digit alphanumeric code that is assigned to teams and delivered to them along with the extraction password.
• Fix: The goal of every CyberTaipan competition is to find and fix vulnerabilities in their images. These images range from simple (e.g. giving users strong passwords) to much more complex. Teams can also gain points by answering questions about their actions on the image. 
• Score: When teams fix a vulnerability that is being checked, they receive points. If they take an action that makes a system less secure, they lose points. Teams can also gain points by answering forensics questions about actions they took to solve their vulnerabilities. Teams can check on their progress at any time on their score report page.
• Compare: A live scoreboard is available for teams to see how they stack up against others in the country. These scores are unofficial and undergo review by CyberTaipan staff following the competition.
• Ask: CyberTaipan staff are available to answer technical support questions during the round by chat and by phone during peak competition hours. Instructions for accessing the tech support chat are sent to teams at the beginning of each round. Teams may not ask questions about vulnerabilities during the technical chats.

After the round

• Delete: All virtual machine images should be deleted after the round is over to maintain the integrity of the competition.
• Wait: CyberTaipan staff review all the scores following the competition and releases official scores and standings to teams as soon as practicable after the round is over.
• Celebrate: Whether or not your team makes it to the National Finals Competition, all competing students should be incredibly proud of themselves! They have learnt invaluable skills and hopefully discovered exciting education and career pathways they were not aware of before.