DARPA's Cyber Grand Challenge - How Does it Strengthen Cyber Security?

Starting with over 100 teams consisting of some of the top security researchers and hackers in the world, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) pit seven teams against each other in the Cyber Grand Challenge final event, held August 4 in Las Vegas. During the competition, each team’s Cyber Reasoning System (CRS) automatically identified software flaws, and scanned a purpose-built, air-gapped network to identify affected hosts. For nearly twelve hours teams were scored based on how capably their systems protected hosts, scanned the network for vulnerabilities and maintained the correct function of software. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, gave us a glimpse into that future last Sunday, when it announced the winners of its Cyber Grand Challenge at DEF CON. "Our mission is to change what's possible, so that we can take huge strides forward in our national security capabilities. And if that's what our job is every single day, I think we did it today," said DARPA Director Arati Prabhakar. Taking home the US$2 million grand prize was ForAllSecure, a startup founded by a team of computer security researchers from Pittsburgh, for its Mayhem system. Winning the second place prize of $1 million was TECHx, made up of a team of software analysis experts from GrammaTech and the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. Third place finisher, Shellphish, a group of computer science graduate students at the University of California-Santa Barbara's SecLab won $750,000. How effective is DARPA's Cyber Grand Challenge in ultimately protecting both government and private sector organizations? Share your comments with the Cloud and Cyber Security Center.