Cyber Teams

5 min read

Set up CTF events in less than 10 minutes with on-demand credits

A step-by-step guide to quickly running CTF events, simplifying threat-informed benchmarking, and enhancing your organization’s security posture.

katemous & pzyc0, Nov 28,2024

With on-demand credits available on CTF Marketplace and a streamlined setup, hosting tailored events is faster than ever. Managers can create events in minutes, track performance, and use insights to shape long-term workforce development strategies.

Incorporating regular CTFs into team practice routines provides organizations with more than just engagement. It facilitates ongoing benchmarking of team performance while driving impactful cyber workforce assessments that boost business-critical operations

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Let’s explore how on-demand CTF credits make it quick and easy to set up events and start reaping the benefits of tailored cybersecurity training and benchmarking.

Supercharge your team’s performance and growth with on-demand CTF credits

One of the biggest ROIs for security team leaders regarding CTFs is the ability to benchmark skills and pinpoint team-wide gaps. However, relying on one-time or periodic assessments is not enough for effective cyber risk management.

With our new streamlined credit purchase process and simplified event setup, organizations gain complete control over CTF management — no external assistance or custom configurations are required.

This flexibility makes it easy to establish a regular cadence of events — whether weekly, monthly, or quarterly — to measure progress, assess readiness, and fine-tune training strategies over time.

Benchmarking and skills assessments are the biggest ROIs for me when conducting CTFs. As I run a team and need to report on the results from the tools that I pay for.

HTB CTF Platform provides security teams with post-event reports that highlight team strengths and weaknesses, enabling managers to design tailored development plans and improve performance based on real-life scenarios.

A sneak peek of some results from our Business CTF, highlighting just some of the key performance insights data you’ll receive. These can be used by technical leaders to customize the team development program based on identified patterns, weaknesses, or opportunities.

The Inter-American Defense Board

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serves as a remarkable example of how benchmarking and collaborative CTFs can effectively reveal skill gaps, standardize training, and foster international cooperation — achieving an impressive 100% boost in cyber training capacity.

How to set up a CTF event, step-by-step

Managers can effortlessly set up a complete CTF event in just 10 minutes with the CTF Marketplace

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— your go-to place for quickly setting up and deploying events, with no technical expertise required.

Select your ideal event pack from the CTF Marketplace

EXPLORE CTF MARKETPLACE

Explore a vast library of curated CTF packs tailored to teams of all sizes and expertise levels. Preview and customize packs to suit your team’s needs, with the flexibility to add or remove Challenges to align with specific goals.

Register your HTB Account

We’ve recently launched HTB Account

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— a unified single account management solution that simplifies your Hack The Box experience.

Simply register

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to get started with your CTF purchase.

Learn how to create and use HTB Account to simplify your login experience

Your HTB account will allow you to set up features to control your overall use. It is a one-stop shop for configuring all your settings for all HTB platforms.

EXPLORE HTB ACCOUNT

Set up your organization

After logging in to the HTB Account, you’ll be requested to create an organization profile directly through the HTB CTF Platform. This allows your team to jump straight into the CTF event without any delays because it eliminates the need for manual setups and approvals — even before activating your subscription.

Customize your CTF event details and complete your purchase

Purchasing an event is quick, with only a few steps, starting with adding event details like name, dates, time, and number of participants.

The credit calculator simplifies planning by providing instant cost estimates. By tweaking factors such as event duration, content capacity (number of Challenges), participants, and Pwnbox

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instances, you can quickly align your event with both your team's needs and budget.

If everything looks good, you can proceed to purchase the required credits — or adjust as needed to ensure you’re ready to launch your CTF event with ease!

Manage your CTF event

After completing the CTF purchase, use our Enhanced Event Management features

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for event coordination. These features make setting up and running your event effortless, providing you with full control over:

Member onboarding and organizational management.
Automated invitations and role assignments.
Challenge management for configurable events.
Content categorization and filtering.

Improve skills, knowledge retention, and team engagement

Empower your organization to run frequent and impactful CTF events with our streamlined CTF credit purchase process, optimizing your CTF strategy to drive measurable outcomes and achieve long-term success.

Here’s how self-served CTF credits can improve key organizational metrics:

Increased participation and engagement

With quick and seamless event setup, team members can focus on collaboration and problem-solving rather than logistics, resulting in higher participation rates and greater enthusiasm.

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More frequent assessments that lead to a deeper understanding of team knowledge

Frequent CTF events provide managers with a clearer picture of team strengths and skill gaps, enabling them to refine training strategies and align efforts with organizational goals.

Enhanced knowledge retention

Regular exposure to practical challenges ensures skills are retained over time, fostering a culture of continuous learning

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and improved readiness to tackle real-world threats.

More flexibility in event management

Customizable events allow for laser-focused skill assessments, such as tailored candidate screenings or specific team exercises, ensuring each CTF aligns with organizational priorities.

Investing in a consistent and flexible CTF schedule enables organizations to leverage benchmarking for building resilient security strategies, ensuring effective and sustainable risk management in the digital world.

Wrapping up the setup process

Having covered all the key phases, here’s a mapped process outlining the steps to use CTF credits for creating engaging and insightful CTF events.

Ready to transform your cybersecurity training into a benchmarking powerhouse?

Jump into the CTF Marketplace and save time setting up an event that aligns with your business objectives.

GET STARTED

If your organization already has an enterprise plan but does not include Capture The Flag events, please contact us

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to integrate them. CTFs are an excellent starting point for regular assessments and can help establish a more comprehensive workforce development program with Hack The Box.