TeleChallenge

The original phone based puzzle challenge, proudly an official contest at DEF CON since 2018.

Last Notes

2025-08-25 19:26:16 GMT

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We brought a legitimate, actual celebrity to @npub1dqd…8xy4 this year. David Yang, one of the world's most traveled people (he has visited all 7 continents and every country in the world) signed autographs on Saturday morning at our booth. Here's an interview we did with him about Red Sea Cruises ports of call, which was only available to hear through the TeleCast phone system: https://youtu.be/NyelK-2rvBI

2025-08-20 00:10:55 GMT

If anyone has photos of our booth this year, we'd love to see them!

2025-08-17 04:09:17 GMT

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One of our puzzles this year required players to provide a professional license number. This could include a ham radio call sign. We actually didn't verify this at all (although nobody lied to us for some reason), but we were happy to misdirect people anyway! @npub1gur…03da was giving ham radio exams right behind us, so we directed players who didn't have a professional license to them.
Naturally, we created a full ham radio study guide (with all original music from our TeleChallenge soundtrack) as one of our channels! To build this, we converted KB6NU's "No Nonsense Technician Class Study Guide" to audio format, which became the "Ham Radio Channel." We hope that even if you didn't win the TeleChallenge, you at least learned something new. :)
Enjoy the Ham Radio Channel here: https://youtu.be/zU90HDY33Ow

2025-08-15 00:43:36 GMT

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We spend nearly a year building the TeleChallenge. For 2025, we created 21 channels of television-style audio content (most of it completely original) along with a soundtrack we produced for the game. It's a completely immersive world which is unlike anything you have ever experienced. If you find this intriguing, we hope you'll look for us and play next time. Part of the puzzle is figuring out that you're in one.

2025-08-15 00:42:51 GMT

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We don't give many hints, but there's a reason why our first content drop is something called "Stonks Financial." When you're hacking an organization, you should understand the full context of it, who's important in the organization, and what is both most vulnerable and most valuable.
Hackers usually go straight for IT systems. What's really valuable, though, is the assets, information and capabilities of the organization. The shortest path to those is often not through IT systems, and even if you have full control of IT systems, you won't necessarily understand the full context of information you're seeing.
Learn about the business side of an organization! That's what we try to teach you in the TeleChallenge--just a little--along with building a really fun puzzle for you to solve. We hope to see you next year, and we are so grateful to @npub1dqd…8xy4 for giving us the space to keep doing this crazy thing.

2025-08-15 00:24:45 GMT

Did you see a company called TeleCast at @npub1dqd…8xy4 handing out really strange flyers? It was really the TeleChallenge, bringing you 21 great channels of content. We'll be sharing most of this for you to enjoy over the coming weeks. This is the Stonks Financial channel.
We think @npub12gx…vj30 will appreciate his favorite loyalty program, MilleMiglia, becoming the basis of the entire global economy. ;)
https://files.defcon.social/dcsocial-s3/media_attachments/files/115/029/920/265/491/653/original/e5db1c3c5de5d8b0.mp3

2025-07-24 01:03:14 GMT

Information wants to be free!
https://files.defcon.social/dcsocial-s3/media_attachments/files/114/905/512/820/988/028/original/09982634a09a91fd.mp3

2025-07-21 02:50:34 GMT

We're in the final stretches of launching the TeleChallenge at @npub1dqd…8xy4. Follow https://defcon.social/@telechallenge to keep up to date. As an official DEF CON contest, we will exclusively post on defcon.social and the DEF CON Discord this year. Any other social media using our name isn't us.

2025-07-21 02:41:37 GMT

Hold, on wait. What's that vibration? Do you feel the rhythm of the earth, @npub1dqd…8xy4
https://files.defcon.social/dcsocial-s3/media_attachments/files/114/888/910/112/149/115/original/c312037efcb1d167.mp3

2025-06-25 19:38:56 GMT

Always with you @npub1dqd…8xy4 https://youtu.be/FAynlWoauXg

2025-06-12 20:56:35 GMT

Setting sail shortly for @npub1dqd…8xy4 - join us!
https://youtu.be/FDyvApkm-Ts