Capture the Flag

A file to open.
Not a question to answer.

Every Capture the Flag challenge hands the student something real to work on — a config, a capture, a log — which they download, open, and are graded on what they get out of it. Nothing is multiple choice. It runs beside the taught programs, timed and scored, for the five days a week the trainer is not in the room.

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Elapsed00:00 Flags0 / 3 No-hint streak0

evidence.txttier 1

Three sample challenges, playable here. In the platform a student downloads the artifact and works it in their own terminal.

Why it exists

The hard part of a course is not
the hours you teach.

It is the other five days. A student who does nothing between Tuesday and the following Tuesday arrives having forgotten the lab, and the trainer spends the first hour recovering ground. Capture the Flag is what a student does in that gap, without a trainer present and without anyone having to set it.

A student's Capture the Flag page: rank inside the unit and the division, flags captured, hours practised, a no-hint streak, and how far ahead of the student behind them they are — **CAPTURE THE FLAG** · Rank inside the class and across the academy, flags captured, hours practised, and a no-hint streak still running.

What a challenge actually is

Evidence, then an answer
the student had to find.

A challenge is not a question with four options underneath it. It is an artifact and a task.

Something real to open

A configuration file, a packet capture, an encoded string, a log. The student downloads it and works on it with their own tools, the way the job is actually done.

Graded on what they extract

The answer is the thing they found inside it — a port, a version, a hash, a hidden value. Either they found it or they did not, and nobody can guess their way through.

Timed, and scored

Every challenge records how long it took. A student can run one with no hints at all for a harder score, and a no-hint streak is worth holding on to.

Difficulty is stated

Challenges carry a tier from foundations up to advanced, matched to the level of the program they sit beside. A beginner is not dropped into exploit development.

Rank that is real

Standing inside their own class and across the whole academy, with the gap to the student behind them shown. Competition between people who actually know each other.

Progress the trainer can see

Flags captured, hours practised, which modules are cleared. A trainer walks into the next class knowing who worked and who did not.

Three grounds

Foundations, defence, offence.

Challenge tracks follow the program catalog, so what a student practises in their own time is the same material they are taught — not a separate puzzle collection bolted on beside it.

XE · Foundations

Numeral systems, IP addressing, network services, the command line, OSINT. Where a student with no background starts, and the tracks a school can put in front of a first-year intake.

NX · Defence — blue team

Network research, Windows and Linux forensics, OSINT, SOC analysis, malware analysis. The work of the people a company actually hires to watch its network.

ZX · Offence — red team

Penetration testing, offensive scripting, web application security, exploit development. The advanced end, and the reason students stay on a platform after their course finishes.

If you run the academy

Something to sell that
does not cost you hours.

Every hour of teaching a training company sells has a trainer standing in a room behind it. Capture the Flag does not. It runs on its own, it keeps students engaged between the sessions you are paid for, and it gives you something to show a corporate client that a slide deck cannot: their own people, ranked, with a record of what they actually did.

Included in the base tier

Not an upsell, and not an add-on.

Capture the Flag is part of what a partner gets, in the same tier as the labs, the scenarios and the certification route. There is no higher tier that unlocks it, and no per-student charge for a challenge attempted.

Next step

Browse the program catalog.

a full catalogue of programs across seven levels — choose by audience, role, or specialization to see exactly what a student covers.

View Programs See the Platform

A file to open.Not a question to answer.

The hard part of a course is notthe hours you teach.