Zeek Package Contest
- Are you a Zeek user?
- Do you enjoy writing Zeek scripts?
- Do you like being recognized for your awesome work?
- Do you want to make the world’s networks safer?
- Do you like winning prizes and claiming bragging rights?
- Do you want the opportunity to present your work at Zeek events?
If you answered, “yes” to any of the above questions, then the Zeek Package Contest sponsored by Corelight, Inc. may be just the competition for you!
This contest is intended to inspire Zeek users to demonstrate their creativity and ingenuity while winning the admiration of their peers, and giving back to the community.
What is the Zeek Package Contest?
The challenge is straightforward: Create an innovative and useful open source Zeek package that extends Zeek’s threat hunting and detection capabilities.
- 1st place wins one free trip (hotel and airfare) to ZeekWeek 2019, $5000 cash and Zeek swag (T-shirts, stickers, etc)
- 2nd place wins $2500 cash and Zeek swag (T-shirts, stickers, etc)
- 3rd place wins $1000 USD cash and Zeek swag (T-shirts, stickers, etc)
- 4th and 5th place wins $100 gift card and Zeek swag (T-shirts, stickers, etc)
The winners may also get the opportunity to present their work at future Zeek events and/or have their contributions featured on the Zeek blog.
Submissions need to be made available through the central Zeek package repository. We will evaluate them in terms of their overall functionality & quality, utility for incident responders, customizability, test coverage, and clarity of documentation. The jury will consist of Zeek core developers and other long-time Zeek community members. More details below.
Jury Members
- Aashish Sharma (Community)
- Jeff Atkinson (Community)
- Johanna Amann (Corelight)
- Justin Azoff (Corelight)
- Nick Turley (Community)
- Robin Sommer (Corelight)
- Seth Hall (Corelight)
- Vlad Grigorescu (Community)
Important Dates
- Submission opens: August 1, 2019
- Submission deadline: September 1, 2019
- Notification: September 25, 2019
- Announcement of results: ZeekWeek 2019 (October 8-11, 2019)
Contest Results
Winners are listed at: https://zeek.org/2020/04/06/2019-zeek-package-contest-summary-and-winners-zpc-1/
Rules of Engagement
- The goal is to create an innovative and useful Zeek package that’s compatible with the Zeek Package Manager. The focus is on Zeek scripts, not binary plugins. A package may include a plugin to support its scripts through new built-in functions (“*.bif files”). However, the contest will not consider packages with other binary functionality, such as protocol or file analyzers, log writers, input readers, etc.
- To submit a package to the contest, it must first be made available through the central Zeek package repository. You can then nominate it for consideration by filling out the webform. Please include with your nomination: a link to the package’s git repository, a list of authors, a short summary describing the motivation for the work, and documentation of the package’s usage. We will acknowledge receipt, and we will evaluate the version of the package as the package manager installs it at that time.
- All submissions must be received no later than September 1, 2019, 11:59PM PDT. The winners will be notified on September 25, 2019.
- Packages already included in the Zeek package repository prior to the start of this contest, 1 August 2019, will not be eligible for this contest.
- Submitted packages must work with the Zeek 2.6 release. They must build and install on recent, standard Linux systems. Please specify any specific OS requirements of your package, if necessary.
- Submitted packages must be open source. We prefer BSD licensed submissions, but will accept any OSI-approved license. By submitting an entry, you declare that you own the copyright to the source code and all related materials, and are authorized to submit it.
- Submissions may leverage other packages included in the Zeek package repository as dependencies as long as the package manager can resolve them during installation. They may also link against external libraries as long as their installation is clearly documented and easy to follow.
- The top 5 winners of the contest will get the prizes mentioned above. We reserve the right to award fewer than 5 awards if we do not receive a sufficient number of high-quality submissions.
- A committee of Zeek core developers and other long-time Zeek community members, chosen by Corelight, will decide the winners based on the following criteria: overall functionality & quality, utility for incident responders, customizability, test coverage, and clarity of documentation.
- In order to collect the cash prizes, winners will need to provide a legal picture identification and bank account information within 30 days of notification. The bank transfer will be made within two weeks after the winner is authenticated.
- Group entries are allowed; the prize will be paid to a person designated by the group.
- You may submit more than one package for the contest, but we limit awards to one per person/group.
- Names/aliases of the winners will be listed on the “Zeek Package Contest” web page.
- Zeek team members, members of the selection committee, and Corelight employees are not eligible to participate.
The Legal Stuff
In no event will Corelight be liable to you or any party entering this contest for lost profits or any form of indirect, special, incidental, or consequential damages of any character from any causes of action of any kind with respect to this contest, whether based on breach of contract, tort (including negligence), or otherwise, and whether or not you have been advised of the possibility of such damage.
More Information
Find out more about Zeek at: https://www.zeek.org/
Current packages list can be found at: https://packages.zeek.org/ and https://github.com/zeek/packages
The Zeek Package Contest is inspired and modeled after the Hex-Rays Plugin and Volatility contests.