Checkers, Scrabble, Risk—these are just a few of the most popular board games of all time. But none of them focus on crime, justice, and the rule of law. Enter RPS Cyberstrike, a board game about cybercrime created by 22 high school students from Rutgers Preparatory School (NJ) for kids ages 13 to 18. The collaborative game—in which everyone wins or loses together—teaches players about cybercrime and how it can be countered, reflecting the need for cooperation in promoting global security.
Under the guidance of Mythili Lahiri, associate director of the Innovation Center at Rutgers Prep, students spent several weeks studying cybersecurity and learning from experts, including Kateri Gill from the Center for Internet Security who visited the school in spring 2018. They spent the 2018–2019 school year applying their knowledge to the game’s design, which features random attacks in the form of energy hacks, identity theft, government information leaks, and fake news. David Merges, now a junior, reflected on the nearly two years it took to create and test the game: “It’s different from anything I’ve ever done—and it’s different from playing any other game, because you know how it was made and how much went into it.”
Developed with an $8,000 grant from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime’s (UNODC) Education for Justice initiative, the game was featured in June at New York’s longest-running game festival, Games for Change. The UNODC, which now owns the rights to the game, is working to translate it to other languages so it can be shared with schools around the world.
(Left) Students at the Westhill Institute in Mexico City test Cyberstrike.
(Below) Rutgers Prep students Divleen Singh, Shreya Aravindakshan, David Merges, Rishie Seshadri, Uma Balasubramian at the Games for Change festival in New York.
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