Hackers to hackers

The ultimate social network for cybersecurity professionals, ethical hackers, and security enthusiasts. Connect, learn, and grow together.

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Inspiration

The cybersecurity community has long needed a dedicated space that goes beyond traditional social platforms. While tools like LinkedIn and Discord serve general networking and communication needs, they lack the depth, structure, and real-time capabilities tailored specifically for cybersecurity professionals. We were inspired to build HTH (Hackers To Hackers) as a secure, real-time, and community-driven platform where ethical hackers, researchers, and learners can connect, grow, and collaborate.

What it does

HTH is a real-time social networking platform built exclusively for cybersecurity professionals. It offers:

  • Live messaging and feed updates
  • Professional profiles with verified certifications
  • A badge-based achievement system for HTB, THM, and more
  • A marketplace powered by a virtual currency (Cubes)
  • Integrated cybersecurity tools and script sharing
  • Group discussions by specialization
  • Full-stack mobile-friendly experience
  • A secure, production-ready environment with real-time WebSocket-based features

How we built it

  • Frontend: Built using React 18 with TypeScript, styled with Tailwind CSS, and structured with Redux Toolkit for state management. We used Vite for fast development and builds.
  • Backend: Powered by Supabase, using PostgreSQL with Row Level Security (RLS), real-time subscriptions via WebSockets, and serverless Edge Functions for backend logic.
  • Marketplace & Payments: Implemented an internal currency system (Cubes) with Stripe integration for secure transactions.
  • Security: Enforced RLS, API protection, OAuth authentication, and input validation to ensure secure and compliant operations.

Challenges we ran into

  • Real-time complexity: Synchronizing real-time notifications, messaging, and feed updates across all users without race conditions or data leaks.
  • Certification verification: Designing a flexible badge and verification system that supports dozens of certification providers with linkable proof.
  • Tool execution safety: Ensuring secure parameter handling for user-submitted scripts and tools.
  • Scalability concerns: Designing a structure that can scale with community growth while keeping performance high and costs predictable.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

  • Developed a fully functional, production-ready social platform tailored specifically to cybersecurity professionals.
  • Achieved seamless real-time communication with minimal latency.
  • Created a working badge system that supports verifiable cybersecurity certifications.
  • Designed and implemented a functional digital marketplace with currency handling and protected downloads.
  • Passed a comprehensive security audit with excellent metrics across the board.

What we learned

  • Building a niche social platform requires balancing general UX principles with community-specific features.
  • Real-time WebSocket infrastructure needs careful tuning to be both performant and secure.
  • Community trust is built on verifiability, transparency, and intuitive tools – all of which must be baked into the system design.
  • Integrating open-source security tools into a social platform opens powerful use cases but also unique challenges in execution safety.

What's next for Hackers to Hackers

  • Mobile App: Building native iOS and Android versions for wider accessibility.
  • Gamification: Introducing leveling systems, CTF integrations, and weekly challenges.
  • API Access: Providing public APIs for researchers and developers to extend the platform.
  • AI-Powered Insights: Using machine learning to suggest collaborations, learning paths, and threat alerts.
  • Enterprise Integration: Offering org-level accounts for SOC teams, training providers, and tool vendors.
  • Global Outreach: Partnering with security conferences, communities, and cert providers to onboard diverse users.
  • Blockchain integration: I was going to add this feature but i run out of token, the goal is to make every single script, badge, or copyrighted article an NFT. in market where cyber security proffesionals will exchange it and it will depend on the value of the assets each user hold.

NB: I couldn't complete the messaging because i run out of the token. the project is 0.0.4v and not even close to 1.0.0 the beta version before the release. I truly hope this idea become a reality because cyber security proffesionals needs a true platform that centerlize everything it's better then trying to follow A in twitter and B in linkedin and C on discord. it's not proffesional. at all.

I couldn't claim my domain because i couldn't access to my netfly account after having my github account flaged as a spam. I was using it as SSO to enter netfly application.

HTH is just getting started — the goal is to become the definitive platform for cybersecurity networking, knowledge-sharing, and career development.

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