11th May 2017
Computer Science students recently took part in the Netcraft challenge. We caught up with Second Year student Kajetan Champlewski, who told us all about the day…
Computer Science students
Every year the internet security company Netcraft, based in Bath, holds an event for schools which have performed well in the Cipher Challenge. The event is typically themed around the type of work the company carries out, and this year the theme was preventing phishing. Phishing is the act of stealing a user's personal details by using a site which pretends to be a bank, email service, or other place where the target enters personal details. Netcraft analyses where these sites send their stolen credentials so that the criminals responsible can be stopped.
As part of the event, our team had to analyse three real world phishing sites and locate which email addresses, log files, and other sites received the stolen credentials. This was both a fun test of our computing experience, and a good source of insight into the type of work carried out at Netcraft and in the cyber security field in general. At the end of the competition our team came second, and outperformed the best teams when the same competition was attempted at Southampton University and Imperial College London.
Events such as these provide students with useful insight into one of the fields they may wish to work in, and allow for further opportunities - Netcraft has suggested to some computer science students that they should consider applying for summer internships. We hope that students doing computer science next year will also pursue this opportunity and are also encouraged to take part in the cipher challenge, which is worth attempting even on its own merit.
