When AI Acts: Hacking the Age of Agentic Systems

AI security has been a recurring theme at HITCON. As language models evolve from linguistic comprehension to agentic action, the security challenges of AI have grown substantially.

LLMs are inherently susceptible to adversarial attacks; vulnerabilities such as jailbreaking, prompt injection, and model alignment represent challenges that are theoretically difficult to eliminate. As Agentic AI bridges diverse systems, it not only inherits vulnerabilities from the underlying infrastructure but propagates them across all integrated environments, forming a complex and interdependent supply chain that significantly expands the attack surface.

Beyond this, the foundation model, training procedures, training datasets, and even Tool Use all emerge as new attack vectors, yet security continues to be deferred to the final stages of the development lifecycle, repeating a well-worn mistake from IT history.

How to embed Security-by-Design into AI system development in this new era has become the next critical challenge for the information security community.

Perimeter Security is Dead, Long Live Resilience

As information and network systems become ubiquitous worldwide, the attack surface is growing increasingly complex, rendering traditional perimeter defense mechanisms ineffective against modern threats. We continue to see an influx of system vulnerabilities and APT attacks, which are nearly impossible to completely eliminate. Meanwhile, the continued proliferation of ransomware groups poses a direct threat to the continuous operations of businesses and organizations, severely impacting critical infrastructure such as healthcare, transportation, energy, and telecommunications. Since it is impossible to achieve 100% protection against all attacks, the key challenge in cybersecurity today is ensuring that systems can adapt to emerging cyber threats, maintain operations and withstand cyber threats, and recover quickly after an incident. This is the core principle of Cyber Resilience.

Since HITCON 2018: "Transforming: Cybersecurity and Resilience", resilience has once again taken center stage. In recent years, events such as the Russia-Ukraine war and the sabotage of undersea cables have underscored the importance of communication security, in addition to traditional cybersecurity. Critical infrastructure, such as undersea cables and low-earth orbit (LEO) satellites, introduces new challenges and discussions in the realm of resilience.

Furthermore, this theme aligns with the Cyber Resilience Act introduced by the European Union. For Taiwan, a major producer of consumer electronics, integrating the Secure-by-Default concept into product development—embedding security into design rather than relying on post-facto mitigation—will be a critical issue worthy of further exploration.

20 YEARS OF HITCON：

MIND MELD HACKER SPIRIT FROM HUMAN TO AI

HITCON celebrates its 20th anniversary, marking two decades of evolution from an underground gathering to a prominent hacker conference. Over the years, it has burgeoned into a thriving hub for the cybersecurity community, fostering rich and vibrant communities around the world. The journey has witnessed the emergence of new technologies such as mobile, cloud computing, and cyber warfare. Despite these advancements, the core essence of the hacker spirit, commitment to research, innovation, discovery, hacking everything, and securing the cyberspace, remains unaltered, serving as the guiding force behind our discussions and explorations.

In recent years, the emergence of artificial intelligence (AI) has brought about a paradigm shift in cybersecurity. As we integrate AI into our daily hacking missions, we are faced with the challenge of aligning its capabilities with our values and objectives. Aligning AI with the hacker spirit becomes paramount, ensuring that our endeavors remain rooted in ethical and principled hacking practices. This Mind Melding of AI with the hacker spirit represents a new frontier in cybersecurity.

Theme

There is no black nor white in the realm of technology. Hackers, as we see them, encapsulate top-notch skills and challenge-seeking spirits. Unlike commercial conferences, HITCON provides a stage for hackers to share the latest and advanced security technology and have discussions with everyone. We take great care of our sessions to make sure that everything published in HITCON is commercial-free research, latest trends, or advanced hacker skills. We also hope that every session is interesting to our attendees.Hacks in Taiwan Conference (HITCON), a technology-orientated cybersecurity conference annually held in Taiwan, is dedicated to bringing the latest information and the most in-depth know-hows of cybersecurity technologies and practices to the community.

About HITCON CMT 2023

Over the years, HITCON have invited worldwide speakers and participants to these great events. Also, we facilitated the communities to exchange technical researches, bleeding-edge hacking technologies, and a wide range of corporate security issues.

HITCON 2023 will hold both the community conference (CMT) and the enterprise event. At HITCON CMT, we emphasize the nature of technology, attack and defense skills and mindset, and most importantly the connection between international infosec communities, fostering the hacker community’s own culture.Apart from sharing cutting-edge technological insights, one may also experience hacker culture first-hand—the catalyzing interaction often brings out the most recent, the most interesting, and the most sensitive topic one could imagine. We welcome everyone interested in information security to join this annual celebration of hackers.

Event Details

• Venue: Humanities and Social Science Building (HSSB), Academia Sinica
• Date: 2023/08/18 - 2023/08/19
• Organizers: Association of Hackers in Taiwan (HIT); CHROOT; Institute of Information Science, Academia Sinica

This year, we’ve combined both our community and the enterprise event at a brand new venue, in the name of HITCON PEACE, which is the acronym of “Protect Enterprise And Citizens Ever-after.” We hope that the energy and the spirit of the hacker community could keep protecting society and enterprises. To simultaneously satisfy the needs of the hacker community and enterprises, HITCON PEACE would not only introduce cutting-edge technologies but also covers practical information security content demanded by corporations.

Event Details

• Venue: Taipei Nangang Exhibition Center, Hall 2 - 7F Starlight Conference Center
• Date: 2022/8/19 - 2022/8/20
• Advisors: Industrial Development Bureau, Ministry of Economic Affairs; Association of Hackers in Taiwan (HIT); CHROOT
• Executive Organizers: Association of Hackers in Taiwan (HIT); Industrial Technology Research
• Supporting Organizer: Institute of Information Science, Academia Sinica

  【 HITCON 2021 】

Work from home, hack into home

Due to the pandemic of COVID-19, the lifestyle of humans had been changed fundamentally. Work From Home has become the required option. Our daily life has been furthered to the virtual world. Accompanied by humans taking more time to stay at home, the IoT home devices and services have become more important. Those devices and services will also bring more vulnerability and risk to cybersecurity.

We are also starting to prepare various activities and make sure HITCON 2021 can get close to the human lifestyle and deepen the link with the world. We believe only the HITCON can exceed HITCON. The HITCON 2021 will not only be a cybersecurity conference but also be a conference which can bridge the people and the world.

Event Details

• Venue: Humanities and Social Science Building (HSSB), Academia Sinica
• Date: 2021/11/26 - 2021/11/27
• Adviser: Department of Cyber Security 
• Organizers: Association of Hackers in Taiwan (HIT); CHROOT
• Supporting Organizers: TWCERT/CC; 104 Corporation
• Special Thanks: Great Skyview

【 HITCON 2020 】Herd Immunity for Cybersecurity

At this moment when old orders are facing comprehensive challenges, we seek ways to survive on the darkest road; while physical links are collapsing due to the epidemic, we aim to build a brand-new elastic defense and mindset by uniting the wisdom from communities and corporations. This is HITCON 2020, "We are the one."

Event Details

• Venue: Humanities and Social Science Building (HSSB), Academia Sinica
• Date: 2020/09/11 - 2020/09/12 
• Organizers: Association of Hackers in Taiwan (HIT); CHROOT; Institute of Information Science, Academia Sinica
• Supporting Organizers: TWCERT/CC; Department of Cyber Security 

The theme for this year’s HITCON Community is “Trust in the Untrusted World”.

Trust has always been a central theme in information security. Throughout the years, there are countless incidents that shows the critical role that trust plays, from the certificates that were stolen to sign APT malwares, to the widespread fake news problem. New developments in our industry also warrant our revisit to the trust theme.

Event Details

• Venue: Humanities and Social Science Building (HSSB), Academia Sinica
• Date: 2019/08/23 - 2019/08/24
• Organizers: Association of Hackers in Taiwan (HIT); CHROOT; Institute of Information Science, Academia Sinica
• Supporting Organizer: iThome

A brand new year with new space, new activities, and new resolution! It is an honour of the HITCON GIRLS to be the host of this year's HITCON. Not only do we carry on the technical aspects that HITCON sessions bring, we also have a lot of new activities as well! For example, this is the first conference in Taiwan that introduces digital currencies to the conference; attendees will be able to use digital wallet and HITCON tokens to trade and exachange tie-ins. There will also be blockchain games for attendees to know more about blockchain and digital currencies. Another fun activity we would like to share with you is the HITCON Hackdoor; by a new type of escape game, combining puzzle solving, tutorials, and competitions, we will help everyone to learn and challenge any IoT devices in our daily life, such as IP Cam, WIFI, printers, access control system or any security system and there security issues they might have. More information will be revealed on HITCON's social media networks.

Event Details

• Venue: Taipei Nangang Exhibition Center 5F
• Date: 2018/07/27 - 2018/07/28
• Organizers: HITCON GIRLS; Association of Hackers in Taiwan (HIT); CHROOT

The spread of large-scale attacks in recent years has made the atmosphere of information security even more intense. The resources invested by the national government, the change of mindset of the enterprise, the careful planning of education, and the vigorous development of the community all represent the process of Taiwan's capital security towards progress.

Event Details

• Venue: Humanities and Social Science Building (HSSB), Academia Sinica
• Date: 2017/08/25 - 2017/08/26
• Adviser: Industrial Development Bureau, Ministry of Economic Affairs 
• Organizers: Association of Hackers in Taiwan (HIT); CHROOT; Institute of Information Science, Academia Sinica
• Supporting Organizers: Institute for Information Industry

This year at HITCON Community (CMT), we don't set out theme limits. It is our hope that we can do without unnecessary restrictions and burdens, so that we can follow our aspirations and let HITCON return to its most primitive and pure form.

Event Details

• Venue: Humanities and Social Science Building (HSSB), Academia Sinica
• Date: 2016/07/22 - 2016/07/23
• Organizers: Association of Hackers in Taiwan (HIT); CHROOT

The theme of this year's conference is "Security of Things". HITCON launched special equipment Wargame, Hack2Own competition, and Incredible Hacking Awards, etc., and set up exclusive community activities to encourage all communities to stand on the stage to show the research results and promote their own spirit,

Event Details

• Venue: Humanities and Social Science Building (HSSB), Academia Sinica
• Date: 2015/08/28 - 2015/08/29
• Organizers: Association of Hackers in Taiwan (HIT); CHROOT
• Supporting Organizers: PChome & Skype; iTSA

In this new era of rapid technological development, we are confronted with ubiquitous information security threats and vulnerabilities.

Event Details

• Venue: Humanities and Social Science Building (HSSB), Academia Sinica
• Date: 2014/08/19 - 2014/08/20
• Organizer: CHROOT
• Supporting Organizers: iThome; TWISC; DEVCORE; Fast Crypto Lab

In today's world, wars are no longer just about airplanes and guns. We are facing an era of information warfare without the smell of gunpowder. This year, HITCON is ushering in a brand new future with the theme "Cyberwar: In hack we trust."

Event Details

• Venue: Humanities and Social Science Building (HSSB), Academia Sinica
• Date: 2013/07/19 - 2013/07/20
• Organizers: CHROOT
• Supporting Organizers: XecureLab; Faya; NTU Fast Crypto Lab; Research Center for Information Technology Information, Academia Sinica

HITCON 2012, we cracked iCloud, AppStore, unlisted second-generation EasyCard and Citizen Digital Certificate, and invited foreign experts to share their experience.

Event Details

• Venue: Humanities and Social Science Building (HSSB), Academia Sinica
• Date: 2012/07/20 - 2012/07/21
• Organizer: CHROOT
• Supporting Organizers: evendesign; XecureLab; aniarc; Faya; NTU Fast Crypto Lab; Chinese Culture University

In order to give participants a new experience this year, we have organized a hacker creative cross dressing competition, which is a chance for participants to show their imagination of hackers.In addition, during the conference, there will be "My ShowTime! Show yourself" exhibition space, which will be provided for participants to hold their own activities!

Event Details

• Venue: Humanities and Social Science Building (HSSB), Academia Sinica
• Date: 2011/07/22 - 2011/07/23
• Organizer: CHROOT
• Supporting Organizers: Open Source Software Foundry, Research Center for Information Technology Innovation,Academia Sinica; The Anti-Botnet Project of TANET, National Tsing Hua University; Research and Development of Mechanisms for Botnet Detection and Prevention, National Taiwan University

Due to legal restrictions and different national conditions, Taiwan's hackers cannot communicate as openly as foreign hackers.

Event Details

• Venue: Humanities and Social Science Building (HSSB), Academia Sinica
• Date: 2011/07/22 - 2011/07/23
• Organizers: CHROOT; NET HACK
• Supporting Organizers: Open Source Software Foundry, Research Center for Information Technology Innovation, Academia Sinica; The Anti-Botnet Project of TANET; ZusoSecurity; Phate

Due to legal restrictions and different national conditions, Taiwan's hackers cannot communicate as openly as foreign hackers.

Event Details

• Venue: National Taiwan University of Science and Technology
• Date: 2009/07/18 - 2009/07/19
• Organizers: CHROOT; TWISC
• Supporting Organizers: NET HACK; ZusoSecurity; Phate; Botnet

Due to legal restrictions and different national conditions, Taiwan's hackers cannot communicate as openly as foreign hackers.

Event Details

• Venue: National Taiwan University of Science and Technology
• Date: 2008/07/19 - 2008/07/20
• Organizations: CHROOT
• Supporting Organizers: TWISC; ZusoSecurity

Due to legal restrictions and different national conditions, Taiwan's hackers cannot communicate as openly as foreign hackers.

Event Details

• Venue: National Taiwan University of Science and Technology, RB105
• Date: 2007/07/21 - 2007/07/22
• Organizer: CHROOT
• Supporting Organizers: TWISC; ZusoSecurity

In the first speech of the second hacker conference in Taiwan, we discussed the Security Ecosystem from an innovative perspective and analyzed the current situation and future development of the information security circle.

Event Details

• Venue: School of Continuing Education, Chinese Culture University. Bo'ai Campus
• Date: 2006/07/15 - 2006/07/16

In Taiwan, due to the Internet intrusion and the lack of public understanding of hackers, the term "hacker" has been misled for a long time, making people think that hackers are intruders. As a result, hackers with real technology and sense of justice have participated in underground organizations or foreign activities, and even dared not discuss and publish the technology on the Internet.

Event Details

• Date: 2005/07/16 - 2005/07/17
• Organizer: CHROOT