Team Ireland head to Italy for European Cyber Security Challenge

The cream of Ireland’s young cyber-defenders head to Turin, Italy next month to compete against Europe’s elite hackers and cybersecurity in an annual pan-European competition run by ENISA (the EU’s cybersecurity body), The European Cyber Security Challenge (www.ecsc.eu)

This flagship event has been running since 2016, when Team Ireland were one of ten countries competing. The event has grown every year since then and this year will feature teams of ten from 39 European countries, plus 7 guest countries from outside Europe.

European Cyber Security Challenge

Team Ireland consists of ten young people, aged from just 16 up to 25, with six of the team being aged 20 or younger. Selection for the team began back in March with the national cybersecurity competition ZeroDays CTF (www.zerodays.ie). This ‘Capture-the-Flag’ competition has been running since 2015, and saw 140 teams of four from schools, colleges and companies all over Ireland, converge on Croke Park for the annual competition to be crowned Ireland’s champions. Teams compete across a range of cybersecurity domains in fun, novel challenges, including cryptography, coding, problem solving, reverse engineering and team challenges such as VR gaming, relay Mario Kart and lockpicking.

Individuals who did well in this competition, and in similar more local events, were invited to try out more challenges at www.cybersecuritychallenge.ie, and eligible participants who show promise there were invited to join a squad of around 30 candidates to receive dedicated training, before a final team of ten was chosen at the end of August.

This team of ten will now head to Turin to represent Ireland at the European Cyber Security Challenge, a competition that runs across four days of setup, competition and awards.

The final team features players from all corners of the country, from Dublin to Belfast to Cork and Donegal, Wexford, Offaly, Galway, it is a very diverse team with different backgrounds and varying skillsets, all of which makes for a stronger team.

Team manager Mark Lane, who lectures in cybersecurity at TU Dublin, where the team also trains, said “We’ve been competing in this competition since 2016, and it’s amazing to see it continue to grow. We’re up against some European powerhouses who have massive population bases and resourcing, but we’ve always managed to punch above our weight. I’m really proud of the hard work the team has put in over the last few months, and I’m confident we will do well and continue to improve, as well have some fun while doing it.

This year we’ve had great support from the National Cyber Security Centre, who have awarded us a grant to continue to build on the work with the team, and from our amazing sponsors Cytidel and ReliaQuest, and without them we wouldn’t be able to do what we are doing. CTF’s have really taken off in the last few years and are, in my opinion, the best way for people to learn cybersecurity skills. It’s a very hands-on, and gamified, way to learn, and the competitive side can really spur people on.

It’s also great to see these young talents develop their skills over time, and to see a real team spirit develop. Over the last couple of years, we have worked hard to make CTFs more mainstream, and we’re seeing more schools, coder dojos and colleges taking part. We’d love to see every school in the country taking part. There’s a huge skills gap worldwide, including in Ireland, and these events can highlight and encourage cybersecurity as an interesting, varied, and very well-paid career or college choice.”

Team Bios

Cillian Collins, 22, is the Ireland Team Captain. He’s a recent graduate from NUIG. Cillian also recently became the first Irish player to be chosen for Team Europe, which takes part in the pan-continental International Cybersecurity Challenge in Chile at the end of October 2024.

Dean Brennan, 25, is the team’s vice-Captain. Dean is a researcher with Cyber Skills at MTU Cork, where he is currently in the first year of a PhD at UL researching cyber resilience and cyber range technology. Dean has been competing in CTFs since 2020 and has previously represented Ireland at the ECSC and WorldSkills.

Ciarán Cotter, 23, is a graduate from UCC. He is Ireland’s only full-time bug bounty hunter. He is currently working on building Simian Security, a security research company.

Kacper Palka, 19, is a full-time student at TU Dublin. Kacper comes from Gorey in Wexford and is a specialist in the reverse engineering category and when he’s not CTFing he loves to spend time singing to his ant farm.

Anya, 17, is a student at TU Dublin, with an interest in vehicles and embedded hardware. On the team she currently specialises in the misc category and also works as a software developer.

Rhys O’Kane, is an apprentice software developer at Instil in Belfast, and is also a student at Ulster University. Rhys specialises in the misc category. Rhys and Samuel only started participating in CTFs in April of this year and have blown everyone away with their abilities.

Samuel Bhuiyan, 19, goes by Blank or BlankAmber online. He loves maths and wine, and sometimes both at the same time. In his free time, he enjoys travelling and intends to visit every Subway (the fast food chain) in Europe 🙂 His specialist area is cryptography.

Dara Clarke, 16, is the youngest member of the team and attends Tullamore College. His specialist category is binary exploitation. Dara is also a talented singer and hurler and plays at county level.

Emmet Coyle, 22, is a final year cybersecurity student at ATU in Letterkenny. His specialist area is web exploitation. Emmet has been competing in CTFs for two years and has found that he really enjoys the thrill of solving complex challenges and picking up some new knowledge along the way.

Finnian Oakes, 18, specialises in cryptography. Finn has competed in multiple CTF competitions and has placed nationally. This is his second time representing Ireland. Finn is a Leaving Cert student at Coláiste Chú Chulainn in Dundalk.

Reserves

Rosaleen Van der Wel, 21, is a 3rd-year Digital Forensics & Cyber Security student at TU Dublin in Blanchardstown. Her specialist category is reverse engineering.

Cillian Berry, 17, is a student at Castleknock Community College in Dublin. He started taking part in CTFs earlier this year. His specialist category is forensics. In his spare time he like to eat and also to eat.

Mark Lane is a lecturer in applied cybersecurity at TU Dublin. He is the founder of ZeroDays CTF, Ireland’s national competition, which has been running since 2015, and is now one of the biggest CTFs in the world. He is the manager of Team Ireland and is also Ireland’s representative to the Steering Committee of ENISA’s European Cyber Security Challenge.

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