Manipal: A five-day advanced bootcamp on Controlled Penetration Testing marked the final phase of NCIIPC-AICTE Pentathon 2026, national cybersecurity competition, concluded at Manipal Institute of Technology (MIT), Manipal, recently. Hosted at the School of Computer Engineering, MIT, in collaboration with Centre of Excellence for Cyber Security, MAHE, the bootcamp represented most advanced stage of Pentathon 2026, a flagship national initiative jointly organised by the National Critical Information Infrastructure Protection Centre (NCIIPC) and All-India Council for Technical Education (AICTE). Pentathon 2026 unfolded across multiple competitive phases and attracted wide participation from aspiring cybersecurity professionals.The first phase, a jeopardy-style online Capture the Flag (CTF) challenge, aimed at identifying talent in ethical hacking and penetration testing. After several rounds, over 200 top-performing finalists advanced to the grand finale, where participants tackled fictionalised enterprise-grade cyber-attack scenarios modelled on real-world threats to critical information infrastructure.The bootcamp provided an immersive training experience designed to strengthen practical cybersecurity capabilities. The curriculum covered key areas including Cloud Security, Malware Analysis and Incident Response, Cryptography and Vulnerability Assessment and Penetration Testing (VAPT) Foundations, along with hands-on cyber laboratory simulations and a capstone challenge.
