Positive Hack Days
The forum addresses the security of government and individuals in today's cyberworld, zero-day attacks and digital investigations, cyberwarfare, and cryptography.
Free tickets are available for winners of special white hacking contests and for students who participate in the Positive Education program.
[3][4] Among other speakers were experts from Kaspersky Lab, Russian Agricultural Bank, VimpelCom, Rostelecom, Cisco Systems, Leta IT-Company, Positive Technologies, and PwC.
[6][7] The conference featured Bruce Schneier, an American cryptographer and the author of Applied Cryptography, Datuk Mohd Noor Amin (from IMPACT, UN), and the creator of the password cracking tool John the Ripper Alexander Peslyak (known as Solar Designer).
[8] Significant events included: demonstration of zero-day vulnerabilities in Windows XP and FreeBSD 8.3, cracking iPhone 4S using the popular application Office Plus, and contests in taking control of AR.Drone and analyzing remote banking system security.
The lead speaker of the third forum was Marc "van Hauser" Heuse, the creator of THC-Hydra, Amap, and SuSEfirewall and the founder of The Hacker Choice.
The forum featured a model railroad controlled by real industrial systems, the security of which was to be tested by the participants, and the Labyrinth's rooms, with laser field and motion detectors (10).
George Hotz also won 2drunk2hack, a contest where participants hack web applications and must finish an alcoholic beverage when they fail.
[15] The Russian politician Vladimir Zhirinovsky took part in a discussion about encouraging information security specialists to work within legal boundaries.
The hacker teams had to complete tasks to earn points: for example, hacking the infrastructure of an energy company whose shares were listed on a stock exchange to give an advantage to industry insiders.
The participants competed at a cyberrange with a fictional megalopolis that had companies with offices, telecom operators, railroads, a CHP, many IoT devices, and other objects.
Positive Technologies specialists Kirill Puzankov, Sergey Mashukov, and Pavel Novikov spoke about the insecurity of cellular networks.
[32] PHDays 8 speakers included Ilfak Guilfanov, the creator of IDA Pro disassembler and Hex-Rays decompiler, and Fernando Gont, a security researcher at SI6 Networks.
[34] In addition, PHDays hosted other hacker competitions: participants hacked into surveillance cameras, smart electric meters, and remote banking systems.
[37][38][39] The best attacker teams from PHDays 9 received an invitation to the contest finals at the HITB+ CyberWeek conference in Abu Dhabi, which took place on October 12–17, 2019.
For the first time at PHDays, with the support of FinCERT (Bank of Russia) and CODDY (a programming school), a children's track was held, The Standoff Kids.
However, in November 2020, the organizers isolated The Standoff (cyberexercises held at PHDays) from the forum, making it a separate event during which an online conference took place.
Maxut Shadayev, Minister of Digital Development, Communications, and Mass Media of the Russian Federation, took part in the forum's plenary session.
[50] PHDays 11 became the most attended event yet: 8,700 people visited the forum venue at the Moscow World Trade Center.
[51] In addition to technical presentations, workshops, contests, and discussions on the IT industry regulation and business development, PHDays hosts a large number of activities aimed at creating a free cyberpunk atmosphere.
[52] Famous rock bands, such as Smyslovye Gallyutsinatsii, Neschastny Sluchai, and Undervud have performed at the forum's closing ceremony throughout the years.
In 2014, cyberpunk films were shown at the forum at night, and during the break between presentations there was an audio show called "Model for Assembly.
The Serious Men (SIBUR Digital) won the contest and received a check for 100,000 rubles and certificates for tuition at the Musical Wave school.
