Info on DEF CON DarkNet Project at DEF CON 24

[TheCotMan]

I am not affiliated with this event and nothing I write is authoritative for it.

The DarkNet project is an online and in person game in which players interact with an chat bot that sends them on quests which teach as well as challenge them. Technical challenges related to hacking and security are the most prominent. Each quest line requires the players to work independently or together to solve puzzles, research ciphers, learn new technologies such as PGP or Tor in order to gain points and progress. Many, but not all, of our quests have an in-person component -- we have in the past had a lock picking challenge box at our table, an RFID reader challenge, and badge kits that are involved in making progress in certain parts of the game. We collaborate with other Events, Villages and Contests to share content and send people around DefCon to learn new things -- almost like a mini-DC101 program with a game around it.

Here is our blurb for the event:

Our mission is to secure a safe, independent and self-sustaining community free from intrusion and infiltration by those who would enslave us to their own ends. Our adversaries are many and they grow ever more sophisticated -- spying on us through our information streams and controlling us through the messages we are subjected to wherever we go. We must resist. If you join us, you will be sent on quests to improve your current technical knowledge. You'll meet others like you and will learn from each other and grow stronger. Hidden messages you would never have noticed and accomplishments you would never have achieved alone will be yours to discover. You know that you have what it takes to join us. You'll rise through the ranks as you go and get your chance to take on the man running the show by using all of the knowledge that you have acquired.

Site: https://dcdark.net/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/DCDarknet