Hi everyone,
Since we've wrapped up the course on Monday with revision, we won't be running a lecture on Thursday morning . However, there will be a help session run by Francis to focus on your second report on Thursday from 12-2pm (sorry if this clashes with your tute, consider going to another one - Francis' is right after the help session) in the SecLab .
Thanks,
Hamish
Hi everyone,
Kris has been ill the last couple days so while I will be taking today's 6443 lecture, I won't be able to take the extended lecture today and it has to be cancelled. It was going to simply be revision, so don't worry about any new content. If you have anything you want to go over you can ask your tutors in your tutorials this week.
Assuming Kris is feeling better the lecture on Thursday will go ahead, but if not I will not be available to take it this week so today's 6443 lecture may be our last lecture. I've released the final exam and report 2 specs that were missing, and some exam revision challenges (that don't count for challenge marking but which you can include in your report) will be released today.
I was hoping to get out report marking this weekend, but the tutors are still going through them, so they should come later this week.
Also, a reminder to please fill in MyExperience!
Thanks,
Hamish
Hi everyone,
This is an FYI that you within the next few minutes have received an email with your midterm exam marks. You will not receive an email if you did not submit anything. If you don't get the email and this is unexpected, please email cs6443@cse.unsw.edu.au as soon as possible and I can sort that out.
I will be going over some general exam feedback (individual feedback wasn't given - hopefully for obvious reasons) tomorrow during the lecture.
As it says in the email, we are still working on report marking and I hope to get that to you by Monday's lecture, during the weekend, but at the latest by next Thursday's lecture.
Thanks,
Hamish
Hi everyone,
FYI there will not be a recording for tomorrow's extended lecture. It will be taught by Francis (one of the tutors) and he will be talking about payment bypass techniques. He's asked for the lecture not to be recorded, so if you want to see the lecture you'll need to come in person. The content covered will NOT be assessable, so don't worry if you won't be able to make it. It is a great topic however, so if you can be there, I highly recommend it.
Thanks,
Hamish
Hi everyone,
FYI for those who haven't watched the lecture, we are extending the due date of Topic 4 to Monday at 6pm . This is to give more time to solving challenges despite much of the content being taught today due to the public holiday on Monday.
Thanks,
Hamish
Hi everyone,
Just a reminder that since there is a long weekend this weekend, there will be no tutes on Friday or lectures on Monday. We will be condensing the content into the Thursday lectures instead. If you had a Friday tute, I recommend attending a Thursday tute (see https://webcms3.cse.unsw.edu.au/COMP6443/26T1/timetable) if at all possible.
Thanks,
Hamish and Kris
Hi everyone,
Welcome back from your quiet week. I hope everyone had the chance to destress after catching up on their courses.
Here is the link to submit report 1: https://moodle.telt.unsw.edu.au/mod/turnitintooltwo/view.php?id=8620034
Only one person from each group needs to submit the report. A reminder that they are due at 9am tomorrow (the 31st of March).
Kris.
Hi everyone,
We are extending the Report 1 due date by 24 hours due to the downtime today. There may be some sporadic (but short) downtime later today once I finish the cleanup, but everything should be back online now.
To reiterate: Report 1 is now due at 9am on Tuesday the 31st of March.
Thanks,
Hamish
Hello everyone,
It's now flex week. Take a breather and
start
finish off your reports - a reminder that these are due next Monday. Please ask any questions about reports on the forums, and we'll get to them at some point. Please also email any group issues to cs6443@cse.unsw.edu.au. We have some emails still to get to (sorry, midterm was and is still busy!), but a reminder is helpful.
There will be a help session from 12-3pm on Thursday in the SecLab in K17 (subject to change, we'll edit this notice if it does) run by Francis, focusing on your reports (but he'll be happy to answer challenge related and technical questions as well). We will see about potentially running one on Friday depending on how Thursday's goes.
A couple challenges have been posted on CTFd for those of you who would like to do them. None of it is worth marks, nor is it content for your reports, so it's purely in case you want something to do. They are challenges we can't really put anywhere else, so we might as well release them now.
We are working on midterm marking and expect to get marks out by the end of Week 7. We'll release some aggregate solve statistics (average solves, solve rates, etc) either sometime this week or during next Monday's lecture.
Enjoy your week without lectures and tutes!
Thanks,
Hamish and Kris
Hello everyone!
I hope everyone is progressing in the challenges and studying diligently for the midterm.
The midterm will be held on Thursday the 19th of March (tomorrow!) at 10am Sydney time. It is online and the exam can be accessed at https://midterm.quoccacorp.com . As of posting, this site will show a countdown. Make sure that you have mTLS setup and can see the countdown on the device you intend to complete the exam with. Once the exam begins ( Thursday 19th March, 10am Sydney time), the midterm page will be replaced with links to the exam questions.
If you have special considerations, I will be in touch with you via email tonight. If you are entitled to spec cons and you do not receive an email from me before 8am tomorrow morning, please get in touch with your ELP so that I can make an adjustment.
An exam questions thread is now on the forum and will be the primary method of communication during the exam : https://discourse02.cse.unsw.edu.au/26T1/COMP3443/t/midterm-exam-megathread/71
The submission template is available on WebCMS under Course Work -> Assessment Specs -> Midterm Template, directly here: https://webcms3.cse.unsw.edu.au/COMP6443/26T1/resources/120477 , or alternatively here once the exam starts: https://midterm.quoccacorp.com/template.txt
Your completed exam can be submitted here: https://moodle.telt.unsw.edu.au/mod/assign/view.php?id=8529558&forceview=1 , or found directly on the Moodle homepage.
Finally, our incredible tutors Francis and Nicholas have cooperated to write a small cheatsheet to help you in your study and time management in the exam. This includes helpful tips and links to tools you might find interesting. You can access it on WebCMS under Course Work -> Assessment Specs -> Midterm Cheatsheet, or directly here: https://webcms3.cse.unsw.edu.au/COMP6443/26T1/resources/120479
Please post on the forums if you have any questions. See you in the lectures!
Thanks,
Hamish and Kris.
Hi everyone,
Since the Week 4 Monday lecture had poor audio, we've uploaded last year's recording as an alternative: https://webcms3.cse.unsw.edu.au/COMP6443/26T1/resources/120429
Similarly, since the Week 4 Extended lecture was missed, last year's recording has been uploaded as well: https://webcms3.cse.unsw.edu.au/COMP6443/26T1/resources/120430
The midterm is the same between both courses, so extended content will not be assessed during the midterm, so no need to panic if you can't fit in watching it until after the midterm.
Thanks,
Hamish
Hi everyone,
This morning from ~3am through to ~10am there was challenge and CTFd downtime across all challenges. To avoid any impact on people's submissions, we are extending the due date for Topic 2 by 24 hours to Saturday 6pm . The assessment spec will be updated to reflect this.
I'm also going to take this opportunity to remind everyone to submit the group registration form: https://forms.office.com/r/skrQ1vVYQv
Thanks,
Hamish
Hello everyone!
We hope everyone has been enjoying the course so far!
This notice is to let everyone know that the assessment spec for Report 1 is now available: https://webcms3.cse.unsw.edu.au/COMP6443/26T1/resources/119419
UPDATE 2026-03-03 18:56: Fixed wrong info about allowed group members.
However, more importantly:
Please fill in this form to register your group (or ask to be placed in a group) by the end of Friday : https://forms.office.com/r/skrQ1vVYQv
You will receive a 5% bonus if you correctly register your group and (later on) submit your report.
If you don't currently have a group, I would strongly recommend trying to find a group at a tutorial this week before submitting the above form.
Also an FYI that there will be up to 2 hours of quoccacorp.com downtime from 7pm to 9pm tonight.
Thanks,
Hamish and Kris
Hi everyone!
Welcome to the course! We've finally got the Moodle page set up, which you can use to access the lecture recordings. URL is here: https://moodle.telt.unsw.edu.au/course/view.php?id=96573
The first set of weekly activities is also open, you can see them on ctfd - https://ctfd.quoccacorp.com/ - and the activity description is here: https://webcms3.cse.unsw.edu.au/COMP6443/26T1/resources/119469
Please get to a tutorial this week to get properly set up with mTLS and with Burp+Python as you will need it for the exercises this week.
If you have any questions or difficulties, start with a question on Discourse, or email the class account at cs6443@cse.unsw.edu.au.
Kris.