The goal is to award 1,000 scholarships of $1,000, culminating in a public celebration at EC-Council’s flagship Hacker Halted conference in late 2026. The event will recognize the 1,000 Great Pen Testers, showcase the stories of scholarship recipients, and demonstrate how technical excellence can fuel social change.

Organizations can earn scholarship money by nominating pen-testers to attempt the CPENT exam. For every nominated pen-tester who earns the CPENT certification, EC-Council will donate $1,000 in training credits to your organization. Your organization can award these credits as you see fit, helping someone new to cybersecurity get their start or give someone already in the industry a hand up in a time of need.

EC-Council will supply your organization with a personalized UTM link that will track the pen-testers you nominate back to you. The nomination requires basic contact information, professional background (e.g., LinkedIn, GitHub, Hack The Box handle, etc.), a short motivation statement, and consent to the program rules.

Participating pen-testers are provided with a voucher for a single attempt at the CPENT exam. The 24-hour exam is delivered in a proctored environment to preserve integrity and can be taken in one block or two 12-hour sessions. No retakes are permitted under this campaign.

Candidates who score at or above the CPENT passing threshold are awarded the CPENT certification and enter the Hackers 4 Humanity Hall of Fame. For each CPENT certification earned, EC-Council will donate $1,000 in training credits to your organization to deliver cybersecurity education to underprivileged individuals of your choosing. Documentation of the scholarship recipient and training outcome is required. If an organization’s chosen pen tester candidate fails the CPENT exam, EC-Council will donate $250, rather than $1000.