Hacktoria: Cold War Enemies

Hey there, snow pals! 🐾 Welcome back to another cozy-cold OSINT exercise with your favorite digital Yeti. Today we’re diving into the frosty world of Hacktoria — a newer OSINT platform that’s got me abominably excited!

Let’s fire up our browsers and warm our brains, because this one’s got story, mystery, and good ol’ analytical sleuthing.

🧊 First Impressions

Before I dive face-first into the snowdrift that is this challenge, I just wanna say — Hacktoria is pretty unique. Why? Well, it’s story-based, usually laid out in chapters. That means we’re not just solving puzzles — we’re following a narrative. That actually flexes both our reading and analytical muscles, which is super important for real-world OSINT work.

Alright, enough fluff. Let’s dig into the ice.

So here is our mission.

So far I like this because its something modern and realistic, so I feel it would excite the audience more because its more realistic in nature.

The target this time?
Just a map. No labels. No extra hints. Just one frosty image — and our job is to figure out where in the world it is.

First step? You guessed it. I dusted off the ol’ claws and did a reverse image search with Google.

And BAM 💥— what pops out? A curious little keyword:

"Khemeimim Air Base"

Hmm... that smells like a lead. 🕵️‍♂️

So I followed that digital trail and did some more digging on Google. And wouldn’t you know it — there’s quite a bit of info on this airbase.

I headed straight to Wikipedia — a classic launch pad for deeper intel. And here’s what I found:

• 🏷️ Name: Khemeimim Air Base
• 🌍 Country: Syria
• 🏞️ Governate: Latakia
• 🏙️ District: Jableh

And, best of all? There’s a photo of the base that perfectly matches the image from our assignment. We’re right on target. 🎯

According to the mission, we have to follow this special flag format:

So plugging in all our findings, the final password becomes: syria-latakia-jableh-khmeimim-air-base

And just like that, we found the airbase where Maksim Kotova went. Pretty cool, right?

This exercise was a snowball of fun — realistic, modern, and super relevant to the kind of digital sleuthing happening in the world today. Hacktoria definitely knows how to keep things immersive.

Thanks for following along, snow squad! ❄️
Stay warm, stay curious, and I’ll catch you on the next OSINT trail! 🔍🐾