By Anna Hammond
January 3, 2023
Knock knock, who’s there? It’s 2023! But before we dive head-first into the new year, let’s take a look back at 2022 and specifically at the creators who ruled the bug bounty scene in 2022. These are the top 20 bug bounty creators!
Content creators are incredibly important to Intigriti. We really appreciate all the time and hard work they are putting into enabling a new wave of hackers and security researchers!
This list was handpicked by the community. The ranking is based on the quality and amount of bug-bounty content these creators produced in 2022. Is your favorite YouTubers not on the list? Be sure to Tweet @ us, so we don’t forget to include them next year!
Next to all those great channels, we also want you to check out our very own Intigriti Youtube channel where you can find bug bounty tips, hacking tool reviews, interviews, and more with new videos coming out multiple times a week!
Let’s get into this!
Grzegorz Niedziela takes you on a journey through vulnerabilities that were made public. He focuses on the details of super technical findings, giving the viewer a better understanding of what happened and how the researcher found the vulnerability. This is an excellent way to learn about advanced vulnerabilities and bug chains, especially for visual learners.
InsiderPhd is a UK-based university professor and part-time bug bounty hunter. She regularly releases educational videos on different aspects of bug bounty. Some are vulnerability tutorials with demos, and others tackle the planning side of bug bounties (e.g. taking effective notes, how to choose programs, goal setting, and motivation). This unique approach is particularly interesting to beginners seeking to learn the technical side of bug hunting without getting overwhelmed, and how to find their first bugs.
And oh! You may also know her from our Bug Bytes newsletter!
LiveOverflow may describe himself as a wannabe hacker, but his videos prove otherwise! The Germany-based CTF player is known to upload deep-dive 10-minute explainer videos on various niche topics, pleasantly visualized with easy-to-grasp sketchbook animations. LiveOverflow covers a range of different topics, from educational tutorials to covering real stories, questions, and thoughts related to hacking! His recent Minecraft hacking series is sure to turn heads!
NahamSec is one of the most influential bug hunters and has an incredibly positive impact on the bug bounty community. He is known for interviewing some of the best bug bounty hunters, live hacking streams, tutorials, and vlogs. You’ll also find on his channel talks from conferences he co-organized. Not only did they involve hackers presenting cutting-edge techniques (with a focus on Web hacking), but they also helped raise thousands of dollars for charity!
It’s hard to find the right words for pwnFunction’s Youtube channel. Let’s start with a question. Do you like penguins? If the answer is yes, then you should get hooked now! Okay, one more. Do you like stellar animations? Also yes, okay, you already wanna hit that subscribe button below. pwnFunction has the most beautiful-looking videos explaining you the concepts of various vulnerability types and secrets about the web. He only makes a couple of videos a year, but when he uploads, you know it will be good!
John Hammond is a true legend when it comes to CTF contests. Like his name-twin from Jurassic Park, John is a passionate creator and a humble community member. You may know him from the popular CTF challenges he created for NahamCon and HacktivityCon. What really sets John apart is that he’s not only so good at creating challenges, but also explaining how they work and how you can solve them, educating others, and helping them to reach the next level.
His recent work into reversing REAL malware is also a treat to watch!
What’s Ippsec most well known for? Hack The Box walkthrough videos. Does he rock them? Absolutely! If you want to get into penetration testing, these videos are the best of the best!
Another person with a Ph.D. and a passion for cybersecurity making videos teaching you all the little tricks? Sign us up! These videos are amazing!
Farah Hawa is a bug hunter with a talent for explaining the most complex web vulnerabilities in an easy-to-understand manner. In her unique style, she goes straight to the point and tells you only what you need to know to rapidly grasp a vulnerability.
With his distinctive looks and vaporware aesthetic vibes, STÖK has taken the bug bounty world by storm. He is a vegan-trained chef, IT consultant turned sustainable fashion store owner, bug bounty hunter, and keynote speaker. His videos include a weekly educational show called Bounty Thursdays, talks on how to approach bug hunting, motivational speeches, fun coverage of the bug bounty life, tutorials, and more. Positivity is guaranteed after watching his videos!
Even though he wasn’t really active in 2022 and will most likely post way fewer videos in the future, we still wanted to honor him with this spot this year because of all the great work he has done for the community. Stok has brought the good vibes into bug bounty and without him, who knows how many great hunters would’ve never become bug bounty hunters!
0xdf has made incredible videos on Hack The Box machines and much more. What we love about him is that he doesn’t just show the solution but goes beyond getting a root shell to show exactly what caused the vulnerability!
Cristi Vlad has been a penetration tester for years, and we’re lucky that he decided to share some of the magic with us on YouTube! He has SOOOO many videos that it’s hard to know where to start, but we can promise you that almost all of them are gold!
CryptoCat is an infosec education channel focusing on CTF walkthroughs, binary exploitation, pen-testing, malware analysis, programming/scripting, and more. He usually goes into a lot of detail trying to give you a deep understanding of the topic covered!
Do you know what’s even cooler? He will be joining Intigriti’s community team very soon! So expect a ton more content on the Intigriti YouTube channel from him!
Rana Khalil is a security assessment specialist and part-time bug bounty hunter. On her channel, she focuses on solving every lab of Portswigger’s Web Security Academy. Rana always starts off with a general guide video about a specific vulnerability followed by demonstrating the solution to a handful of labs.
HackerSploit has over 400 videos on hacking. This includes many series on ethical hacking and penetration testing, Linux essentials, challenge walkthroughs, and more! Although he touches on different topics, his specialty is Linux. His videos provide excellent introductions to topics like Docker for Pentesters, zsh, Nmap, etc.
Seytonic makes the best security news content on YouTube. There is just no doubt about it! As bug bounty hunters, we sometimes get in this little bubble where we get a lot of cybersecurity news, but only from other bug bounty hunters. Hacking also has some other sides, and we like to use Seytonic’s videos to get a really easy to digest version of it!
Josh makes videos that could 100% be considered lectures. We love the relaxed style and the soothing voice. All of this makes learning so much better!
“What’s up you amazing hackers?”
If you haven’t heard that sentence before, you need to check out the XSS rat’s content! He regularly publishes short videos on various topics relevant to bug hunters. This includes interviews, tutorials, Q&As, tips, and answers to questions all bug hunters ask themselves when starting out.
Conda is not only a great creator, he also recently reached the top of the leaderboard on Intigriti, which granted him an amazing portrait. If you want to see how this amazing bug bounty hunter started out, be sure to check out his channel!
Hacking Simplified does exactly what the channel name advertises. He makes videos that try to make hacking simpler. Go to his channel to find interviews with noteworthy people in the community, tutorials on everything from Android pentesting to finding vulnerabilities in GraphQL, and much more!
These were our picks for the top 20 bug bounty creators of 2022. Do you want more? Here are some honorable mentions for you!
Did you know Intigriti has its own YouTube channel where they post all kinds of amazing content? No? Check it out now!
Who’s the one writing a lot of the tweets and making many videos for Intigriti? It’s PinkDraconian. But he also has his own YouTube channel that you should definitely check out!