Australians invited to US Hack the Air Force bug bounty

The US Air Force will allow white hat hackers from its Five-Eyes partner countries Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and the United Kingdom to join its bug bounty program for the first time.

Known as Hack the Air Force, the USAF is inviting "vetted computer security specialists" to do their best to hack some of its key public websites.

Registrations for Hack the Air Force open on May 15. The event starts on May 30 and ends June 23 and is run via contractor Hacker One.

“This is the first time the USAF has opened up our networks to such a broad scrutiny,” USAF chief information security officer Peter Kim said in a statement.

“We have malicious hackers trying to get into our systems every day. It will be nice to have friendly hackers taking a shot and, most importantly, showing us how to improve our cybersecurity and defense posture.

"The additional participation from our partner nations greatly widens the variety of experience available to find additional unique vulnerabilities."

Individual bug bounties have yet to be disclosed.

Last year, the US government's Hack the Pentagon program paid out around US$75,000 in bounties. More than 1400 people registered for the program, and participants found 138 vulnerabilities in government websites.

Another government-run program, Hack the Army, attracted 371 hackers who generated 118 valid reports and received more than US$100,000 in bug bounties.