National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO)
Browse and strategize across all 23 official problem statements submitted by National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO) for Smart India Hackathon 2026.
Problem Statements (23)
Match My TeamDeep Learning Based Super Resolution Mapping (SRM) from Medium Resolution Satellite Imageries
National security and geospatial surveillance agencies under the National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO) rely on medium-resolution satellite imagery (10 to 30 meters from Sentinel-2, Landsat) which is widely available but too blurry to resolve strategic infrastructure (airfield runways, coastal naval docks, military vehicle convoys). Build a Deep Learning-Based Super Resolution Mapping (SRM) and Spatial Feature Restoration Platform for NTRO that uses generative adversarial super-resolution networks (ESRGAN / Diffusion models) to upscale 10m satellite imagery to <2.5m high-resolution sub-pixel intelligence.
Leveraging satellite imagery to determine Oil spills at sea along with AIS data correlations to identify vessel responsible for the spill.
Illegal maritime oil spills, tank-wash discharges, and offshore drilling accidents in Indian Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ) cause severe marine ecological damage, while delayed satellite detection allows polluter vessels to flee without liability. Build an AI-Powered Satellite Oil Spill Detection and Trajectory Drift Forecasting Platform for the National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO) combining Sentinel-1 SAR radar imagery, optical MSI feeds, AIS vessel tracking, and ocean hydrodynamic drift modeling to detect oil slicks and identify the culprit ship.
Design & Development of a High-Sensitivity Micro barometer Infrasound sensor
National strategic surveillance under NTRO requires continuous monitoring for covert low-yield underground/atmospheric nuclear tests, missile test launches, and volcanic eruptions, which produce sub-audible low-frequency infrasound acoustic waves (0.01 Hz to 20 Hz) that propagate thousands of kilometers. Build a High-Sensitivity Digital Microbarometer Infrasound Sensor and Signal Analysis Platform for NTRO combining high-dynamic-range differential pressure transducers, acoustic wind-noise suppression filters, and Progressive Cross-Correlation (PMCC) array processing.
AI-Based Detection of Cyber Threats in Unidirectional IP Traffic
Critical national infrastructure networks (nuclear plants, defense command networks, intelligence intranets) use hardware unidirectional data diodes (transmitting data over single optical fibers with physical return lines cut) to prevent cyber intrusion, but security operations centers struggle to detect command-and-control (C2) beaconing, covert data exfiltration channels, and protocol abuse when analyzing one-way, non-acknowledged IP traffic. Build an AI-Based Threat Detection System for Unidirectional Data Diode IP Traffic for NTRO that uses flow statistics, inter-arrival entropy, and packet payload forensics to detect malicious traffic without two-way handshake inspection.
AI-Powered Monitoring & Analysis of Bitcoin Transaction Traffic
Transnational cybercriminal syndicates, drug cartels, and ransomware operators use Bitcoin and privacy-enhancing techniques (CoinJoin mixers, multi-hop layering, nested peel chains) to launder illicit proceeds across pseudonymous blockchain addresses. Build an AI-Powered Bitcoin Transaction Monitoring and Forensic Tracing Platform for the National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO) that ingests live mempool and UTXO transaction graphs, de-anonymizes mixing clusters, detects illicit money laundering patterns, and traces dirty funds to centralized crypto off-ramps.
Automated model for analysis of .IQ and .wav files along with signal parameter extraction
Signals Intelligence (SIGINT) operators at NTRO intercept terabytes of raw unlabelled radio frequency (RF) recordings (.IQ files) and demodulated voice/telemetry (.wav files) spanning unknown radar pulses, tactical radios, satellite uplinks, and encrypted frequency-hopping signals. Build an Automated Signal Intelligence, Demodulation, and RF Feature Analysis Platform for NTRO that ingests raw In-Phase/Quadrature (.IQ) and .wav streams, performs blind modulation classification (BPSK, QAM, FSK, OFDM), measures carrier frequency/bandwidth, and extracts audio intelligence in real time.
Creation of scripts/functions with new programming language to commence Computer & Network forensic analysis without triggering security solutions
Security researchers and vulnerability analysts at NTRO need to test proprietary software and sandboxed targets using modern secure systems programming languages (like Rust or Zig), but traditional testing frameworks trigger aggressive antivirus/EDR heuristic alerts due to runtime signatures. Build a Clean-Room Language Transpiler, Execution Harness, and Static AST Analysis Framework for NTRO that parses custom domain-specific testing scripts, generates clean native binaries with benign metadata and memory safety, and automates penetration testing workflows.
Design and Development of an Integrated Secure Data Erasure and Advanced File Recovery Tool for Digital Forensics and Data Sanitization
Decommissioned government storage media (NVMe SSDs, SATA HDDs, USB flash, eMMC chips) handled by NTRO contain classified national security data where standard OS formatting leaves recoverable forensic fragments in hidden sectors (HPA/DCO, flash bad-block reserves, wear-leveling spare area). Build an Integrated Secure Data Erasure and Advanced Sanitization Platform for NTRO compliant with NIST SP 800-88 Rev. 1 (Purge/Clear) and DoD 5220.22-M standards that executes hardware ATA Secure Erase, NVMe Sanitize Crypto Scramble, and multi-pass cryptographic overwriting with tamper-evident digital certificates.
Development of a Multi-Vendor DVR/NVR Forensic Analysis Tool for Standardized Acquisition, Recovery, and Analysis of Surveillance Evidence.
Digital video evidence recovered from crime scenes and national security incidents by NTRO is locked inside standalone Digital Video Recorders (DVRs/NVRs) running hundreds of proprietary, closed-source file systems (DHFS, HIKVISION, WFS, ZH_FS, Mirage) where hard drives are unreadable on standard Windows/Linux operating systems. Build a Multi-Vendor DVR/NVR Forensic Analysis and Video Stream Recovery Tool for NTRO that performs raw binary carving of proprietary DVR file systems, reconstructs fragmented H.264/H.265 video streams, and recovers deleted surveillance footage.
Dark web threat actor de-anonymization
Hostile threat actors, ransomware cartels, and cyber espionage groups operate behind Tor onion routing, PGP encryption, and cryptocurrency mixers on the dark web, leaving intelligence analysts with fragmented alias trails. Build a Dark Web Threat Actor De-Anonymization and Intelligence Correlation Platform for NTRO that crawls hidden onion services, analyzes PGP key cross-references, extracts digital styling fingerprints (stylometry), and maps cryptocurrency transactions to de-mask adversary identities across surface and dark web platforms.
Social Media Analytics
Foreign psychological operations, coordinated disinformation campaigns, and radicalization networks weaponize social media platforms (X/Twitter, Telegram, YouTube, Reddit) during national security crises to incite communal riots and stock market panic. Build an AI-Powered Social Media Intelligence, Coordinated Inauthentic Behavior (CIB) Detection, and Threat Analytics Platform for NTRO that tracks real-time cross-platform narratives, unmasks synchronized botnet swarms, and maps sentiment polarization.
AI based Network Attack Forecasting from Network Traffic Data
Critical government and defense IP networks face Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs), zero-day exploits, and multi-stage cyber attacks where existing Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS) only generate reactive alerts after a breach has occurred. Build an AI-Based Network Attack Forecasting and Proactive Threat Trajectory Prediction Platform for NTRO that analyzes passive NetFlow/IPFIX telemetry, models multi-stage cyber attack kill chains (MITRE ATT&CK), and forecasts the adversary's next target host 30-60 minutes before lateral movement occurs.
Gen AI Platform for Automated Content Transformation
Intelligence analysts and defense officers at NTRO handle massive volumes of heterogeneous unstructured intelligence (multilingual PDF doctrine manuals, intercepted audio transcripts, scanned tactical maps, structured tabular databases) that require rapid transformation into standardized formats (intelligence briefings, JSON knowledge graphs, executive slide decks, target profiles). Build an Enterprise Generative AI Platform for Automated Multi-Format Content Transformation for NTRO featuring local air-gapped multimodal LLMs, document layout preservation, and schema-guided structured extraction.
AI-Driven Multi-Vendor Network Security Compliance Auditor
Enterprise and government network backbones under NTRO operate thousands of heterogeneous routers, switches, firewalls, and VPN gateways from multiple vendors (Cisco, Juniper, Fortinet, Check Point, Palo Alto, Huawei) with thousands of lines of conflicting CLI configurations, causing security vulnerabilities and regulatory non-compliance with national cyber security guidelines (CERT-In, CIS Benchmarks, NIST). Build an AI-Driven Multi-Vendor Network Security Compliance Auditor for NTRO that automatically ingests heterogeneous raw device configurations, builds a unified abstract network model, audits security rules against CIS/CERT-In benchmarks, and generates remediation scripts.
Universal Log Pre-processing Framework
Security Operations Centers (SOCs) at NTRO ingest petabytes of heterogeneous, unstructured logs (Syslog, Windows Event Logs, firewall text, JSON, CEF, XML) from hundreds of proprietary vendor devices, where manual regex writing fails to parse dynamic formats in real time. Build a Universal Log Pre-processing, Parsing, and Semantic Normalization Framework for NTRO that uses zero-shot grammar inference and drain-tree parsing to automatically structure raw logs into Open Cybersecurity Schema Framework (OCSF) events at 100,000+ logs/sec.
Supervisory Analytics Tool for SOC Assessment (SAT-SA)
National cybersecurity leadership at NTRO struggles to evaluate whether their internal Security Operations Centers (SOCs) and defensive telemetry pipelines are truly capable of detecting sophisticated APT attacks before a real breach occurs. Build the 'Supervisory Analytics Tool for SOC Assessment' (SAT-SA) for NTRO that automatically emulates adversary attack kill-chains (MITRE ATT&CK), tracks detection sensor coverage gaps, and quantifies Mean Time to Detect (MTTD) and Mean Time to Respond (MTTR).
Single-Pass Drone Video to Accurate 3D Model Generation System
Tactical reconnaissance drones deployed by NTRO capture single-pass monocular video over target areas, but classical photogrammetry tools (like Pix4D/Metashape) require hours of multi-pass flight overlap and heavy offline compute to generate 3D elevation models. Build a Single-Pass Drone Video to 3D Photorealistic Mesh Reconstruction Platform for NTRO that uses monocular depth estimation, Neural Radiance Fields (NeRF) / 3D Gaussian Splatting, and structure-from-motion to generate georeferenced 3D digital twins in minutes.
SecureMailScope: AI-Assisted Cryptographic Security Posture Assessment for Secure Email Communications
Enterprise mail servers across government ministries and defense agencies frequently misconfigure TLS encryption, use weak cipher suites (RC4, 3DES), and fail to enforce MTA-STS (Mail Transfer Agent Strict Transport Security) and DANE, leaving diplomatic communications vulnerable to passive wiretapping and Man-in-the-Middle (MITM) downgrade attacks. Build 'SecureMailScope'—an AI-assisted cryptographic security posture assessment platform for NTRO that performs automated scanning of mail servers (SMTP, IMAP, POP3), verifies MTA-STS / DANE DNS records, and generates step-by-step remediation roadmaps.
AI-Powered IPsec VPN Protocol Analyzer and Security Assessment Framework
Enterprise IPsec Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) securing strategic government communication tunnels suffer from misconfigured Phase-1 / Phase-2 parameters, weak Diffie-Hellman groups (DH Group 2/5), deprecated hash algorithms (MD5, SHA-1), and aggressive mode vulnerabilities that allow adversaries to intercept VPN traffic. Build an AI-Powered IPsec VPN Protocol Analyzer and Security Assessment Framework for NTRO that performs passive IKEv1/IKEv2 packet analysis, audits crypto proposals against NIST/BSI standards, and detects handshake downgrade attacks.
Dam Break Inundation Modelling Using Hydrodynamic Modelling of any River
Catastrophic dam failures in India (due to cloudbursts, earthquakes, structural breach) cause devastating downstream flash floods and loss of life within hours, where disaster authorities lack real-time hydrodynamic breach simulation models to plan evacuations. Build an AI-Accelerated Dam Break Inundation and River Hydrodynamic Modeling Platform for NTRO combining dam breach breach-parameter physics (Froehlich / MacDonald formulas), 2D shallow water hydrodynamic solvers (HEC-RAS / LISFLOOD), and high-resolution DEMs to forecast downstream flood arrival times and evacuation corridors in real time.
AI-Based Detection and Classification of Industrial Fires and Persistent Thermal Sources Using NASA FIRMS, OSM & Satellite Data
Industrial fires, illegal chemical factory blazes, gas pipeline blowouts, and coal seam fires across India produce persistent thermal hotspots that cause toxic air pollution and industrial disasters, while standard satellite fire monitors (like FIRMS) suffer from 12-hour orbit delays and low spatial resolution. Build an AI-Based Industrial Fire and Persistent Thermal Hotspot Detection Platform for NTRO combining geostationary rapid-scan satellites (INSAT-3D/3DR), high-resolution Sentinel-2 / Landsat short-wave infrared (SWIR), and deep learning to detect and classify industrial fires within 15 minutes of ignition.
Security Assessment of the World Monitor application
Open-source intelligence (OSINT) and global situational awareness platforms (like 'World Monitor') aggregating live global news, military flight tracking, vessel AIS, and satellite conflict data are vulnerable to API tampering, data poisoning, and unauthorized reverse-engineering. Build an Automated Security Assessment and Red-Teaming Framework for Global OSINT / World Monitor Applications for NTRO that audits web client architecture, tests API endpoints against OWASP Top 10 vulnerabilities, and evaluates supply chain dependency risks.
Enterprise Cryptographic Discovery & Analysis Tool (ECDAT)
Enterprise infrastructure across national security agencies (NTRO, defense networks) contains legacy software repositories, microservices, databases, and network appliances using undocumented, deprecated cryptographic algorithms (MD5, DES, RSA-1024, hardcoded AES keys) that violate modern cryptographic standards. Build an Enterprise Cryptographic Discovery and Analysis Tool (ECDAT) for NTRO that performs static source code analysis, dynamic binary inspection, and network certificate scanning to build an automated Cryptographic Bill of Materials (CBOM) and guide Post-Quantum migration.