China Revives Tianfu Cup Hacking Contest Under Increased Secrecy

China’s Tianfu Cup hacking contest made its return in 2026, now overseen by the government and marked by limited transparency.

Tianfu Cup was launched as an alternative to the Zero Day Initiative’s Pwn2Own competition, which regularly pays out more than $1 million to white hat hackers who demonstrate critical vulnerabilities in consumer and enterprise hardware and software, industrial control systems, and automotive products.

Tianfu Cup made headlines in 2021, when participants earned a total of $1.9 million for exploits targeting Windows, Ubuntu, iOS, Microsoft Exchange, Chrome, Safari, Adobe Reader, Asus routers, and various virtualization products.

The hacking competition took a break in 2022 and returned in 2023 with a focus on domestic products from companies such as Huawei, Xiaomi, Tencent, and Qihoo 360. Little information was provided about the results of the 2023 event.

After a two-year hiatus in 2024 and 2025, the Tianfu Cup returned in ...