Cyprus takes 24th place at European Cybersecurity Challenge in Germany

Bochum, Germany. Cyprus placed 24th among 42 teams at the European Cybersecurity Challenge, with official results showing a score of 3,277.21 points. Its ten young representatives improved on the country’s 28th-place finish in Warsaw, Poland, in 2025.

Competitors from Europe and guest nations

Held from October 12 to 16, this year’s competition attracted over 400 participants between the ages of 14 and 25. They represented 35 European countries alongside seven nations invited as guests.

Sweden won the competition, with Finland taking second and Austria third. The US received recognition as the best-performing guest country.

Practical tests of cybersecurity skills

Supported by the European Union Agency for Cybersecurity (ENISA), the event uses hands-on tasks to assess competitors’ ability to detect and address cyber threats.

Participants go beyond answering technical questions: they identify flaws in computer systems, resolve security issues and defend their networks against attacks.

Scoring centres on two categories. Jeopardy covers fields including cryptography, reverse engineering and web security. In Attack-Defence, teams protect their systems while seeking weaknesses in their rivals’ systems.

The programme added CTF Unplugged this year as a separate challenge conducted offline.

Selection through Cyprus competition

The ten members representing Cyprus were chosen in August through the Cyprus Cyber Security Challenge, an online contest held between August 2 and 9.

The national contest welcomes young entrants with varied backgrounds, including pupils, university students and researchers, alongside cybersecurity enthusiasts who have taught themselves and young professionals.