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Basic Port Scanning Exercise with Capture the Flag and Deduction

Designing engaging exercises when students do not yet possess a lot of knowledge can be difficult. I show how I draw on students' prior knowledge, along with basic introductory concepts, to design an elemental (but fun) port scan exercise in an introductory security testing module. While "capture the flag" is a security industry standard for exercises, it can require a lot of in-depth knowledge to properly implement and complete. Using basic computer science concepts such as ports and ASCII values, I designed a simplified capture the flag exercise where students can make use of deductive reasoning to complete the game.