Simple Google search unlocks GCHQ code-cracking competition

GCHQ’s “Can You Crack It?” website, designed to help recruit talented codebreakers for the British government department, is getting lots of attention from the media and bloggers – but some of that may be unwanted.

A number of bloggers and Twitter users have pointed out that GCHQ appears to have done rather a poor job at locking down the website, making it child’s play for anyone to visit the webpage you’re only supposed to see if you’ve successfully cracked the code.

All it takes to find the page is to use the site: command in Google, as the “Can You Crack It?” webmaster seemingly didn’t hide the success page from search engines…

Read more in my article on the Naked Security website.

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Graham Cluley •   @gcluley

Graham Cluley is a veteran of the cybersecurity industry, having worked for a number of security companies since the early 1990s when he wrote the first ever version of Dr Solomon's Anti-Virus Toolkit for Windows. Now an independent analyst, he regularly makes media appearances and is an international public speaker on the topic of cybersecurity, hackers, and online privacy. Follow him on Twitter, Mastodon, Bluesky, or drop him an email.