This boy earned $36,000 by reporting a security flaw in Google’s systems. For reporting a vulnerability that would have permitted hackers to make changes to Google’s internal systems, a teenager got awarded from the giant of technology.
Ezequiel Pereira has submitted the 5th bug to Google’s bug bounty program and this submission was the most valuable as through this detection he could earn more than $36,000.
He started his bug hunting drive in a very young age and he claims to have found a bug that earned him $500 and this achievement let him not drop hus journey.
“I found something almost immediately that was worth $500 and it just felt so amazing,” he told in an interview adding that “So I decided to just keep trying ever since then.”
Uruguayan teenager Pereira got his first computer at age of 10. Since took his intro class at age of 11, he has been programming. The tech crazy youngster spent years to teach himself various programming languages.
Pereira also participated in several coding contests, including one that earned him a trip to Google’s California headquarters.
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Pereira reported a bug to Google that he found earlier this year.
Recently, he received permission to discuss the bug and the way he found it. Google has confirmed that it had resolved the issue.
In June 2017, Pereira could discover a bug that earned him $10,000. The teenager used part of that money to apply for scholarships to U.S. universities. Though none of the schools he reached out to accept him, he is studying computer engineering in his hometown of Montevideo.
He is hopeful to be able to use his earnings to fund his education, and he anticipates himself be master’s degree holder in computer security. He has only two tasks to spend his earnings, 1st to fund his education and second to help his mother pay the bills.
Up till now, Pereira has only submitted bugs to Google’s bug bounty program, but many tech and video game companies offer similar rewards for discovering and reporting bugs and he can earn money their too. The companies believe that offering monetary rewards will encourage hackers to report exploits rather than sell them to cyber criminal.
Pereira also encourage his friends and others to get involved with bug hunting and he says that anyone can learn this skill of bug hunting.
