mobanmarketNew Delhi: Ethical hacking is no new concept and India has seen a breed of such young enthusiasts in the past. What has changed is the money that comes with it as cyber attacks on businesses across industries have grown multi-fold in the era of digital transformation.
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Meet 23-year-old Shivam Vashist from north India, a hacker associated with San Francisco-based HackerOne which is a vulnerability coordination and bug bounty platform and boasts of clients like Starbucks, Instagram, Goldman Sachs, Twitter, Zomato and OnePlus.
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Better known by his handle @Bull on Twitter, Vashist is a full-time hacker who reportedly makes over $125,000 in a year by finding bugs.
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Over the past few years, he has taught his brother the ropes of hacking, helped his father retire with peace and took family on sightseeing tours across the world.
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“On average, I am spending about 15 hours a week hacking. However, it varies from time to time, depending on my schedule. Some days, I might be working on something for days continuously, while at other times, I may not be hacking for weeks,” said Vashist.
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In the Asia-Pacific region, the number of hacker-powered security programmes has grown by 30 per cent year on year.
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Hackers in the US earned 19 per cent of all bounties last year, with India at second spot with 10 per cent.
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“In fact, HackerOne’s ‘Hacker-Powered Security Report 2019’ shows that $2,336,024 of the bounties awarded in 2018 went to the ethical hacker community in India,” said Vashist.
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He started learning more about computers and the ethical hacking world when he was 19.
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The family was worried in the beginning.
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“However, they came to understand what I was doing over time, and know that an ethical hacker is completely legal, and a viable career. Since then, they have been very supportive,” he added.
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He earned his first bounty at age 20 from InstaCart, and then MasterCard.
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“It was an incredible feeling, I couldn’t believe I did it! The rush it gave me left me sleepless for days,” said Vashist.
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More companies now pay for bug-finding
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In August, HackerOne revealed that hackers earned $21 million in just a year reporting vulnerabilities via various bug bounty opportunities as governments’ efforts to fix malware increased a whopping 214 per cent globally.
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Food delivery platform Zomato has paid more than $100,000 (over Rs 70 lakh) to 435 hackers till date for finding and fixing bugs on its platform.
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OnePlus announced this week that it had set up a Security Response Centre that would offer a bug bounty to security experts, who discover and report on potential threats to the company’s systems. Rewards for qualifying bugs reports will be in the $50-$7,000 range.
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“Hacking gives me a high when I am able to think of creative ways to tackle the challenges and discover vulnerabilities that no one has yet found,” said Vashist.
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“A bug bounty programme is one of the best ways to do security. The sheer reach of the talent pool of hackers from all over the world is so powerful. I feel that every company should consider having a bug bounty programme in place,” he added.
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Apple has opened a bug bounty programme for security researchers wherein it will pay between $100,000 to $1 million for finding bugs.
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According to Vashist, India is on the digital path but computer security does not get nearly enough attention and there are probably a lot of vulnerabilities in our systems that are left unchecked.
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“More cybersecurity awareness is needed. More education about security solutions and reaching out to the community of ethical hackers might be one of the ways to help,” he added.
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There are only a few companies in India that have a bug bounty programme right now.
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“I do foresee that the adoption rate will increase in the coming years,” the young hacker said.
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