RHUL Cyber CDT Blog

  “Some other countries are struggling, such as Mexico. They need to tackle crime, not cyber security. ” “The price of Chinese technology is much more accessible compared to European or American companies. Paraguay does not produce any technology.” “In Latin America we can confuse some platforms with the internet itself. The experience of going online is through social media apps, this is a challenge.’’ “Latin America is the most peaceful region regarding interstate conflict and most violent in interpersonal conflict and/or violence. We have to shift focus more towards everyday violence and the use of technology to oppress people.’’ These quotes, captured in a workshop held by the Digital Security in Latin America Research Group (DLSA) in December 2022, illustrate a very important (if sometimes overlooked) point: the importance of context. By context we refer essentially to how the digital relates to, shapes, and is shaped by the on-the-ground realities emergent in a specific...

In February I had the honour and the pleasure of being invited to coach the fantastic team Krack-In Security for this year’s  Cyber9/12 competition , a mixed university team made up of four students from Durham, Edinburgh and St Andrews.  I entered Cyber 9/12 as a competitor for Royal Holloway in 2020, coming in as finalists, and I got so much value from the experience that the next year I volunteered to be part of the organising team. It was brilliant to experience the competition this year in person again for the first time since 2020, and from a different perspective. In the lead up to the competition students receive an intelligence brief containing a range of artefacts from news reports through to government communications. Their job is to digest and analyse the information to try and get a handle on what is actually going on. My role as the coach was to help develop their ideas and theories, and help to rein in some of the more out-of-the-box suggestions. With lots of ha...