Vincent's Blog

NorthSec 2022 - Portobello 53

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 21:35:07 -0500

portobello53.pcapng is the artifact from NorthSec 2022’s Portobello track; a series of challenges named after the five stages of grief (Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression). The 53 is the port number, which tells you most of what you need to know before you open the file: everything happens over DNS.

This is a re-run of a challenge I solved back in 2022 when I was in the CyBeer & Gineer team, specificaly with the help of @Res260. This write-up has been redone properly and documented using my old notes from our private CryptPad document and the Discord server we used during the competiion (which surprisingly are still up). Everything below is reproduced from the capture with tshark and a handful of short Python scripts, as well as how I originally did it during the competition.

Decrypting a Mythic C2 with Wireshark

Tue, 07 Jul 2026 20:00:00 -0500

Here is a write-up of a team project I did for INF807 (Digital Forensics in IT Security), where we used Wireshark not as a network-troubleshooting tool, but as a forensics instrument: to prove that a piece of malware presented as evidence hadn’t been tampered with in transit, and to reconstruct an attacker’s actions even though the command-and-control channel was encrypted twice over.

This blog was temporarily written by AI to test the visual radar. The handwritten blog will be available soon.

Passed SecurityX and obtained CSIE. Now what?

Fri, 13 Feb 2026 01:31:22 -0500

I passed the SecurityX exam last week after about three months of training and I want to share some thoughts about the CAS-005 exam, about my previous CompTIA certifications (Security+, PenTest+, as well as CySA+) and a general review of whether it was worth it as a whole.

This blog post has been entirely written by hand, and not generated by AI.

My experience prior to passing SecurityX 💼

I’ve been in the IT industry for nearly eight years, five of them in cybersecurity; about a year and a half as a blue teamer, and three and a half years in vulnerability management. I earned a couple of certifications during that period, notably Security+, PenTest+, CySA+, as well as OSCP and AWS Security Specialty more recently. Since then, I went back to school to pursue my master’s degree. All in all, especially in my current position, I’ve had the opportunity to work in multiple areas related to cybersecurity, but also IT in general. All of this helped me prepare for this exam.

An overview of OSCP+ and PEN-200

Tue, 27 May 2025 01:31:22 -0500

I passed the OSCP+ exam. Here’s how I did it, and more importantly, how you can maximize your own chances if you plan on taking on the challenge. This post is meant to be a practical guide, from the moment you start wondering whether you’re ready all the way to submitting your exam report.

This blog was temporarily written by AI to test the visual radar. The handwritten blog will be available soon.

An overview of OSWP and PEN-210

Mon, 26 May 2025 01:31:22 -0500

I passed the OSWP exam last year after about two months of training and I wanted to share some thoughts about the exam and about my experience with the PEN-210 course.

This blog was temporarily written by AI to test the visual radar. The handwritten blog will be available soon.

How to approach the PEN-210 course 📶

If you have a LearnOne subscription (the year-long access to OffSec’s platform), you get access to two “lighter” courses on top of your main course: PEN-100 (KLCP) and PEN-210 (OSWP). I’d suggest starting with PEN-210: the content is the same level as PEN-200, but the duration is much shorter (about 23 hours of content).

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Thu, 20 Apr 2023 00:00:00 +0000

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Vincent's Blog

NorthSec 2022 - Portobello 53

Decrypting a Mythic C2 with Wireshark

Passed SecurityX and obtained CSIE. Now what?

My experience prior to passing SecurityX 💼

An overview of OSCP+ and PEN-200

An overview of OSWP and PEN-210

How to approach the PEN-210 course 📶

About

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