Storyline & Briefing
Read this before you start. It covers how tonight runs, who you are for the next two hours, what you're expected to do, and what's already known about the incident before your investigation even starts.
Tonight's Schedule
Three phases, two hours total. Solve the case before it's too late.
Forensics Academy
Guided training. Your facilitator walks you through six tutorials (T1–T6). Unlimited tries - This is where you pick up every tool you'll need for the real case.
The Investigation
The real case file opens. Work through the different difficulty levels at your own pace. Submit answers as flags in CTFd. Hints are available if you're stuck, at a small point cost. Three wrong attempts locks a challenge, so make your submissions count.
Case Closed
Scoreboard reveal, walkthrough of the WHO, WHERE, and HOW. Here is where you'll find out here whether your answers matched what actually happened.
Your Role
You're a newly assigned Junior Forensics Analyst at Meridian, brought in specifically for tonight. You don't know the building, the staff, or the politics yet, and that's fine. What you do have is a stack of logs, exports, and printouts nobody else has had time to go through properly. Director Voss is waiting for your intelligent guesses, solve it before its too late.
Your Orders
- Sit through the drills. Every technique in the Forensics Academy shows up again later tonight.
- Work the case in order. You are advised to do the challenges in order. Each tier leans on skills from the one before.
- Keep the Case Files board open. Use the Characters & Clues page to cross off suspects and locations as you clear them, and jot your own theories in the notes. It doesn't affect scoring.
- Submit through CTFd. Answers are text only, exactly as the format shown in each challenge. No code or files to upload.
- Ask for hints through the portal. All hints can be found above the question files. Each hint costs a few points.
Timeline — What We Know So Far
This is everything Director Voss can already confirm before your investigation starts. Claims below are just that, claims, not verified facts.
Ordinary shift start. Staff badge in as usual across the building, nothing flagged.
Riley Cooper, Night Analyst, says she was in the Parking Lot.
Jordan Blake, Operations Lead, says he was in the Break Room.
A short team meeting is scheduled somewhere in the building. Details unclear for now.
Casey Nguyen, Senior Systems Engineer, says she was in Server Hall A.
Meridian holds its internal vote for the new Deployment Team Lead role. Five people are running: Priya Sharma, Diego Martinez, Sam Ortiz, Noor Hassan, and Casey Nguyen. Ballots are cast in the Break Room.
The new-hire cohort is in the Hardware Lab for certification exams and retakes, supervised straight through the night. Phoenix Doyle, overnight security, is on his usual rounds. Facilities keeps a running power draw log on both server halls, as always.
Riley Cooper flags an anomaly in ECHO's checkpoint logs. This is the moment the case opens.
Director Voss calls in your team. Everything from here is your job to work out.
Rules of Engagement
- Three wrong flag submissions locks a challenge for good. Think before you submit.
- Hints cost points the moment you unlock them, whether or not they help. That's normal, not a bug.
- Flags are text only, case and formatting matter less than you'd expect but follow the example given in each challenge.