HP ZDI Calls Off Hunt for Exploit Unicorn in Pwn2own 2015

Hewlett-Packard’s Zero Day Initiative (ZDI) has announced the rules and prize structure for its 2015 Pwn2Own browser hacking challenge that is set to occur March 18 and 19 during the CanSecWest conference in Vancouver, British Columbia.

In the 2014 Pwn2Own event, the largest single prize was $150,000 for the Exploit Unicorn. However, no researcher was able to claim that prize in the 2014 event. The Exploit Unicorn prize required a researcher to exploit IE 11 on Windows 8.1 64-bit, with EMET running. Many of the facets of the Exploit Unicorn were rolled into the base ruleset of this year’s Pwn2Own, according to Gorenc.

“We also wanted to offer a top-up award of $25,000 for system-level bugs through any Windows-based target,” Brian Gorenc, manager of vulnerability research for HP Security Research said. “This change broadens the contestants’ available attack vectors to win extra money.”

Read the full story at eWEEK:
HP to Award Big Money to Winners of Pwn2Own Browser Hacking Challenge

Sean Michael Kerner is a senior editor at InternetNews.com. Follow him on Twitter @TechJournalist.

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