battleCTF Qualifier Rules

Format

Jeopardy-style, 31 days, four categories: pwn, web, OT/ICS, vuln-research. Solve challenges, submit flags, points accrue on the scoreboard.
The top 8 African participants on the final scoreboard advance to the Battle finale, a single-elimination 1v1 bracket (quarter- finals, semifinals, final).

One account per person. Playing under multiple accounts, or sharing an account with someone else, gets both removed from the scoreboard.

Flags follow the CTF{...} format. Submit exactly what the challenge gives you, nothing added or stripped.
Sharing flags, writeups, or specific solve steps with other players while the Qualifier is still open is not allowed. Discussing general concepts or techniques, not tied to a specific live challenge, is fine.

A public writeup is required for every challenge you solved, published after the Qualifier closes.
No writeup, no qualification for the Battle finale - this applies regardless of your scoreboard rank. Submitting incomplete, fabricated, or copy-pasted writeups that don't reflect your actual solve counts as not submitting one.

Any tool is fair game, including AI/LLM assistants. There's no restriction and nothing to declare.

Attack the challenges, not the platform. Don't target CTFd itself, the scoreboard, other players' accounts, or infrastructure outside what a challenge's own scope describes.
No denial-of-service against challenge instances, the platform, or other players. A challenge that stops responding for everyone because of one player's traffic is treated as an infrastructure attack, not a solve.
No automated mass-scanning or brute-forcing of flag submissions against the scoreboard.
If you find a bug in the platform itself (not a challenge) rather than an intended vulnerability, report it privately to the organizers instead of exploiting it.

Harassment, cheating, or attempts to socially engineer the organizers or other players out of flags or credentials get you removed from the event.
Organizer decisions on scoring disputes and rule interpretation are final.

Violating any of the above forfeits your points, standing, and Battle-finale eligibility at the organizers' discretion. Repeated or severe violations may result in a ban from future BUG|PWN events.

Organized by BUG|PWN and Cyber.industries.