Students from Purdue Polytechnic’s School of Applied and Creative Computing dominated the leaderboards at two major Capture the Flag (CTF) competitions held at Blue Team Con 2025, one of the premier conferences for cybersecurity defenders.
The students swept the top three places in the team-based Hack the Box CTF and also secured top finishes in the individual Last Minute CTF competition, a powerful demonstration of the hands-on cybersecurity talent being cultivated at Purdue.
Samuel Ho, a Ph.D. student who placed first in the team event and second in the individual competition, explained that he wasn’t even aware of the Purdue sweep until after the event, as most participants compete under pseudonyms.
"When I later discovered that the top three teams were all Purdue students and alumni, I was extremely proud," Ho said. "It really shows that Purdue students are not only technically capable but also able to excel in both offensive and defensive cybersecurity disciplines."
Ho noted that the two competitions were designed to test a wide range of skills. "The Hack The Box CTF was heavily penetration testing–focused, requiring participants to identify and exploit vulnerabilities across simulated environments," he explained. "In contrast, Blue Team Con’s annual Last Minute CTF was incredibly diverse, featuring challenges in open-source intelligence, network traffic analysis, digital forensics, reverse engineering, and even physical challenges that sent competitors running around the conference floor."
The winning teams from Purdue during the Hack the Box CTF were:
- 1st place: Samuel Ho, Chris Spankroy, Michael Jenkins
- 2nd place: Michael Wong, Mason Liang, Kevin May
- 3rd place: Kacper Ramotowski, Nandan (Nico) Sudunagunta, Nithin Veeramasuneni
In the individual Last Minute CTF, Samuel Ho placed second and Michael Jenkins placed fourth.
For the students, these high-pressure competitions are a crucial part of their education, providing an opportunity to apply classroom knowledge to real-world scenarios.
"Competitions like these help us bridge theory and practice," Ho said. "They push us to think outside the box under pressure, and stay current with emerging tools and attack techniques. These experiences directly translate into the kind of quick problem-solving and technical depth that are essential in cybersecurity careers."
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