Bright brains build bold ideas at Hackathon
There is something special about bringing talented people together in one room with a shared goal. That energy was on full display at the recent CyberWest Hub and DGov Hackathon, facilitated by youth innovators, Bloom.
Kicking off at Bloom HQ in Crawley and fuelled by free drinks and pizza, always a winner, teams were formed under the watchful eye of our friendly cyber industry mentors, who generously volunteered their time to support participants throughout the event.
The packed kick off night on Tuesday 2 June set the tone for the two-day challenge. Expertly facilitated by Bloom community coordinator Brandon White Harris and guided by CyberWest Director Cecily Rawlinson, participants paired with mentors and began brainstorming solutions.
Tasked with exploring how the Office of Digital Government might help agencies prepare for and respond to cyber incidents, teams selected from a range of challenge areas and worked together to develop practical solutions. With mentor support, they prototyped and tested their ideas before presenting to an expert panel on Thursday night.
“WA government agencies need to be prepared for all kinds of cyber incidents, and that kind of risk readiness will look different across departments, teams and systems,” Cecily said.
“It was fantastic to see the teams develop solutions together, drawing on their knowledge and skills and using artificial intelligence to come up with innovative approaches to real world challenges.
“Getting practical advice and guidance from industry and government is highly beneficial to students and others advancing their careers in cyber security.”
The challenges covered a broad spectrum of priorities, including Essential Eight compliance, supplier risk assessment, vulnerability and threat intelligence, identity and access management, and cyber preparedness and response innovation.
Breaking into their groups, teams spent two full days building and refining their solutions, supported by mentors and event organisers.
The energy built to a high point on pitch night, where teams presented their ideas to a supportive crowd. Each team delivered a rapid three-minute pitch, followed by questions from the panel.
Mentor Duncan Alderson from Signal 11 said he was impressed by the standard of work and the way teams used AI to accelerate their ideas.
“Across the event, participants showcased creativity, collaboration and a genuine passion for solving real world challenges through cyber and digital innovation,” he said.
“This is the first Hackathon that I have been a part of since we have seen real advancements in Generative AI.
“The participants used this to their full advantage to show not only small prototypes but fully functioning platforms.”
The excitement continued into the final evening as teams gathered for presentations and to celebrate their achievements. Join us to celebrate all the participants!
First Place, team Harmony: Vladimir Vorotilov and Ilya Sapelkin
Second Place: team UWA AI ID: Michael Nefiodovas and Mahit Gupta
Third Place, team TriageMate: Namash Aggarwal, Matthew Yuan, Amalia Townley and Joshua Chambers
CyberWest Hub congratulates our winners and extends sincere thanks to our mentors for their time and expertise.
A special thank you to Brandon and the team at Bloom for hosting and facilitating another successful CyberWest Hub and partner hackathon. Here is to the next one!