Symantec Awards First Prize in Global Hackathon to Four South African Students
July 19 2018 - 12:00PM
Business Wire
South African team wins #Hackathon4Justice
competition promoting crime prevention and cyber security
skills
Symantec Corp. (NASDAQ: SYMC), the world’s leading cyber
security company, today announced Team ‘Wakanda Vibes’ from South
Africa as the winner of its recent hackathon hosted in partnership
with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the
Africa Teen Geeks organization.
From July 9-11, 2018 at Symantec’s Mountain View campus, four
teams from across South Africa, Bolivia, Indonesia and the United
States competed for three days to develop educational games and
applications that teach values around social justice and respect
for the rule of law relating to crime. Hackathon participants
created various applications that focused on:
- Human trafficking, highlighting the
importance of tackling this crime, and providing users with quick,
useful resources to get information about the topic and report it
to authorities as needed.
- The online risks that social media can
pose, such as cyber crime and human trafficking, teaching teenagers
how to be safe online and protect their privacy.
- Cyber crime, with the aim of promoting
equality and equal development within society, encouraging users to
build infrastructure like schools and hospitals. To advance in the
competition, participants must navigate a series of hypothetical
problems, like corruption, cyber crime and migrant smuggling in
building their virtual infrastructure.
“The talent, creativity and technical chops that these young
individuals demonstrated were incredible to witness,” said Amy
Capellanti-Wolf, Chief Human Resources Officer at Symantec.
“Symantec is extremely proud to support such a strong cause that
empowers the next generation to hone their computer science skills,
develop products for good, and ultimately help create a better
society.”
Teams were assessed by the hackathon contestants themselves as
well as a panel of judges, including Lisa Martin, Executive
Director of MUN Impact; Jillian Scott, Director of TechWomen;
Gilberto Duarte, Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice Officer of
UNODC; Kenneth Schneider, VP of Technology Strategy at Symantec;
Deena Thomchick, Senior Director of Product Management at Symantec;
and H.E. Ambassador Dr. Saif bin Mohammed Al-Kuwari, member of the
Qatar National Cyber Security Committee.
The Symantec-sponsored hackathon was the final round of
competition for the winners of three regional hackathons that took
place in South Africa, Indonesia and Bolivia over the past year.
For more information about the hackathon, including visuals from
the event, please visit:
https://www.symantec.com/blogs/feature-stories/next-generation-teens-display-tech-chops-symantec-hackathon.
About the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime
UNODC works to counter drugs, crime and terrorism, and mobilizes
and promotes regional and transnational cooperation to confront
these threats. Specific efforts are made to target the world’s most
vulnerable regions, where the convergence of these issues threatens
regional and global security. UNODC works directly with
governments, international organizations, and civil society. For
more, visit www.unodc.org and find us on Facebook, Twitter, and
LinkedIn.
About Africa Teen Geeks
Africa Teen Geeks is one of the largest computer science
education nonprofit organizations in Africa. Since its inception
three years ago, Africa Teen Geeks has impacted over 40,000 kids
and is growing with campaigns such as Girl Geek, Computer Science
Week and Knit2code, a programme that teaches girls with no access
to computers coding by utilizing knitting. For more information,
visit www.africateengeeks.co.za and find us on Facebook,
Twitter, and LinkedIn.
About Symantec
Symantec Corporation (NASDAQ: SYMC), the world's leading cyber
security company, helps organizations, governments and people
secure their most important data wherever it lives. Organizations
across the world look to Symantec for strategic, integrated
solutions to defend against sophisticated attacks across endpoints,
cloud and infrastructure. Likewise, a global community of more than
50 million people and families rely on Symantec's Norton and
LifeLock product suites to protect their digital lives at home and
across their devices. Symantec operates one of the world's largest
civilian cyber intelligence networks, allowing it to see and
protect against the most advanced threats. For additional
information, please visit www.symantec.com or connect with us on
Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
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version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180719005146/en/
SymantecLauren Armstrong,
650-448-7352Lauren_Armstrong@symantec.comorEdelmanSamantha Eisen,
206-506-6579Samantha.Eisen@edelman.com
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