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Microsoft BlueHat Security contest - Mega Prize $250,000
Microsoft today launched a $250,000 contest for researchers who develop defensive security technologies that deal with entire classes of exploits. The total cash awards for Microsoft's "BlueHat Prize" contest easily dwarfs any bug bounty that's been given by rivals. The company announced the contest as this year's Black Hat security conference got under way today in Las Vegas.
"We want to make it more costly and difficult for criminals to exploit vulnerabilities," said Katie Moussouris, a senior security strategist lead at Microsoft, in a news conference today. "We want to inspire researchers to focus their expertise on defensive security technologies." "Overall, it seemed to us that to take an approach to block entire classes was the best way to engage with the research community and protect customers," said Moussouris.
WHAT IS THE CONTEST?
The inaugural Microsoft BlueHat Prize contest challenges security researchers to design a novel runtime mitigation technology designed to prevent the exploitation of memory safety vulnerabilities. The solution considered to be the most innovative by the Microsoft BlueHat Prize board will be presented the grand prize of US $200,000. Important information:
- Entries will be accepted and must be received by email to bluehatprize@microsoft.com between August 3rd 2011 to midnight Pacific Time on April 1st 2012.
- The winning entry will be announced at Black Hat USA 2012.
- For full details, see rules and regulations.
- Prize
First prize: $200,000 (USD)
Second prize: $50,000 (USD)
Third prize: MSDN Universal subscription valued at $10,000 (USD) - More Details here