People generally think that today’s youth are less committed and concentrated on certain tasks. People draw such conclusion as they see teenagers spending more time in technology and making internet as part of their life. They think youths spend almost 24 hours on social media and it looks like watching videos in YouTube and television is teenagers’ daily routine. 

But unlike other teenagers, Niraj Tiwari recently developed NepKnox which he claimed to be Nepal’s first adventurous game. With this achievement he proved that youth can be productive as well as innovative with the help of technology. He successfully uploaded it on Google Play store on December 6, 2017 which is installed by more than 5,000 people. 

However, it was not an easy task for 18-year old Tiwari while developing the game. “In the beginning, I was so frustrated that at times I decided to quit it. But I just kept on scribbling codes, and codes to complete the game. After continuous practice and concentration for 40 days, I finally succeeded to develop Nepal’s first adventurous game,” he shared. 

Tiwari became curious in computer programming since he observed some names that in computers based on Microsoft OS cannot save as files, folders, or anything. “As I realized that folder name like ‘con’, ‘aux’, ‘nul’, ‘com1’, ‘lpt’, and ‘prn’, the magical words cannot save and even rename in computer, I was surprised and willing to know the reason behind it,” he said. “After reading some books and research findings, I found the reason behind it.” 

“Well, it goes back to MSDOS. Device names were recognized before path names. “CON” was the console device, “AUX” was the auxiliary device, “PRN” was the printer, along with “LPR<digit>”. “COM<digit>” refers to a com port. There are others. Note that these names ignored the file extension such that “CON.EXE” still meant the console,” he shared. 

Despite of having sufficient resources, he had learnt different programming language courses through internet than from any institute. He had learnt via many free and best websites like edx.org, codecademy.com, coursera.org, codewars.com, javatpoint.com which are providing course from top universities like MIT, Stanford, and Harvard. 

Then he started learning about cyber attacks, web portal systems, penetration testing, web-related vulnerability testing, SQL database and server networking. These all helped him being certified as WhiteHat Hacker by Intel Corporation, one of the best and reputed companies in the world. 

According to Tiwari, as cybercrimes has become a major problem, he chooses the path of being WhiteHat Hacker to control cybercrime. “As you can see the news that hacker group from Russia, Pakistan come to Nepal, hack the ATM, and stole all money, I decided to become White Hat Hacker to control this illegal hackavist,” he said. “Hat hackers are the ethical hackers. They help to remove viruses, perform pen tests and generally help people understand where their vulnerabilities are and fix them.” 

He completed his higher study from St Xavier’s College, Maitighar and is now planning to explore more knowledge about computer science. In future, he wants to focus mainly on two things education and issues of bank hacking. He said in 2017, hackers from Russia and Pakistan had launched a dangerous virus called ‘Nukebot’ which had raided maximum Nepali Bank account and stolen their money. So to control bank hacking, he is planning to establishing maximum of securities and authentications in banking sectors.

Likewise, he yearns to increase literacy rate in Nepal through developing a donation app. He thought the app will help those students who can’t afford their study. “If one of us just donate one rupee, there would be millions. And, that can be useful to help the students who can’t afford for their studies on their own,” he stated.

He believed that nothing can be achieved without hard work. He says youths must not be fearful of failure. “No one is perfect in the world. Don’t fear for failures in your attempts, because even the successful math starts with the number zero. While developing my game, I failed many times, but I didn’t give up. In the end, I made it,” he said.