Trend Micro Awards Over $1,000,000 to Ethical Hackers

Participants at Pwn2Own Ireland discovered scores of zero-day vulnerabilities

DALLAS, Oct. 27, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Trend Micro Incorporated (TYO: 4704; TSE: 4704), a global cybersecurity leader, today celebrated the efforts of the global security research community at Pwn2Own Ireland. Contestants discovered and disclosed 73 unique zero-day vulnerabilities in printers, network storage systems, smart home devices, surveillance equipment, home networking equipment, flagship smartphones, and wearable technology.

To learn more about Pwn2Own Ireland 2025, please visit: https://www.zerodayinitiative.com/blog/2025/10/23/pwn2own-ireland-2025-day-three-and-master-of-pwn  

Rachel Jin, Chief Platform and Business Officer at Trend: "Our mission is to approach security proactively and gather the deepest threat intelligence in the industry. The 73 zero-day bugs discovered at Pwn2Own will directly help make the digital world a safer place. We're proud to empower vendors to patch these vulnerabilities while offering our customers protection from exploits well ahead of any other cybersecurity provider. As cyber risk continues to rise worldwide, Pwn2Own remains a valuable tool in staying ahead."

A total of $1,024,750 in prizes were awarded to the participants. Research conducted at Pwn2Own enables Trend to protect customers from zero-day exploits an average of 71 days ahead of the industry, an essential advantage in the race against cybercriminals.

The event featured a variety of highlights as hackers competed for a cash prize pool of over $2 million:

• Ben R. and Georgi G. of Interrupt Labs used an improper input validation bug to exploit a Samsung Galaxy S25—including its camera and location tracking—earning $50,000
• Ken Gannon / 伊藤 剣 of Mobile Hacking Lab, and Dimitrios Valsamaras of Summoning Team leveraged five different bugs to exploit the Samsung Galaxy S25, earning them $50,000.
• Bongeun Koo and Evangelos Daravigkas of Team DDOS used eight different bugs, including multiple injections, to complete a "SOHO Smashup" of the QNAP Qhora-322 router and QNAP TS-453E NAS device. They earned $100,000 in the process.
• dmdung of STAR Labs SG Pte. Ltd used a single OOB access bug to exploit the Sonos Era 300 smart speaker, earning $50,000.
• Sina Kheirkhah and McCaulay Hudson of Summoning Team exploited a pair of vulnerabilities to hack the Synology ActiveProtect Appliance DP320.
• Although Team Z3 withdrew their attempt to demonstrate a zero-click exploit of WhatsApp, the research was shared privately with Trend Micro ZDI and Meta to ensure that any potential vulnerabilities could be patched.

The next competition, Pwn2Own Automotive, will be held in Tokyo, Japan on January 21-23, 2026.

About Trend Micro
Trend Micro, a global cybersecurity leader, helps make the world safe for exchanging digital information between people, governments, and enterprises. Trend leverages security expertise and AI to protect more than 500,000 enterprises and millions of individuals across clouds, networks, endpoints, and devices worldwide. At the core is Trend Vision One™, the only AI-powered enterprise cybersecurity platform that centralizes cyber risk exposure management and security operations, delivering layered protection across on-premises, hybrid, and multi-cloud environments. The unmatched threat intelligence delivered by Trend empowers organizations to proactively defend against hundreds of millions of threats every day. Proactive security starts here. TrendMicro.com

SOURCE Trend Micro Incorporated