University of Central Florida Wins 2015 National Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition

  • 04/24/15

SAN ANTONIO, TX — The University of Central Florida (UCF) beat out nine other finalist teams to win the 2015 National Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition (NCCDC), presented in partnership with Raytheon Company. This is the second year in a row UCF has won the competition. Held April 24-26 in San Antonio, TX, the competition challenged top college and university teams from across the country to keep a mock business running while defending against continuous cyber attacks from government and industry experts. The nation's largest competition of its kind, NCCDC is organized by the Center for Infrastructure Assurance and Security (CIAS) at the University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA).

More than 200 colleges and universities and 2,400 undergraduate and graduate students participated in competitions that led up to this year's national championship, which featured the winners of 10 regional competitions nationwide from February through early April.

“The talented men and women who demonstrated their impressive skills at the 2015 National Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition give us great confidence in the ability of the next generation of cyber defenders to guard our critical cyber infrastructure,” says Dave Wajsgras, president of Raytheon Intelligence, Information and Services. “Through our partnership with NCCDC, Raytheon not only provides financial support, volunteers, and expertise, but also a domain environment to create a realistic experience. Because of Raytheon's efforts and those of the other sponsors, we are helping to develop the cyber security workforce of the future.”

Modeled from real-world scenarios, NCCDC was the first national cybersecurity competition designed to test how well college students operate and manage a network infrastructure similar to those found in the commercial sector.

At the end of the competition, University of Central Florida earned the highest score and also earned the coveted NCCDC Alamo Cup trophy for the second year in a row. Raytheon will also bring the winning team to Washington DC, this summer to tour some of our nation’s top research and national security cyber sites.

In addition to UCF’s top finish, University of California, Berkeley placed second, and Rochester Institute of Technology placed third. The 10 schools that competed at the championship were:

  • University of Alaska Fairbanks, At Large Regional CCDC Winner
  • University of Maryland, Baltimore County, Mid-Atlantic Regional Winner
  • DePaul University, Mid-West Regional Winner
  • University of Nebraska at Kearney, North Central Regional Winner
  • Rochester Institute of Technology, Northeast Regional Winner
  • ITT Tech Boise, Pacific Rim Regional Winner
  • Southern Utah University, Rocky Mountain Regional Winner
  • University of Central Florida, Southeast Regional Winner
  • University of Texas at San Antonio, Southwest Regional Winner
  • University of California, Berkeley, Western Regional CCDC Winner

Sponsors of NCCDC include government agencies, colleges and commercial companies. In addition to Raytheon as the title sponsor, the following organizations were also sponsors:

  • Platinum sponsors: Department of Homeland Security (DHS) – Science and Technology, Splunk and Walmart
  • Program sponsors: National Security Agency, Strategic Cyber LLC, U.S. Army Intelligence and Security Command (INSCOM), and the U.S. Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command (SPAWAR)
  • Gold sponsors: Boeing, Facebook, FireEye, Guidance Software, Juniper Networks, and Microsoft
  • Silver sponsors: Amazon, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Goldman Sachs, McAfee, Parsons, Hershey's
  • Other sponsors include: The Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association (AFCEA), Denim Group, INDEED.com, (ISC)2, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP), Opmantek, Secure Decisions, Wonderware

About Raytheon
Raytheon Company, with 2014 sales of $23 billion and 61,000 employees worldwide, is a technology and innovation leader specializing in defense, security and civil markets throughout the world. With a history of innovation spanning 93 years, Raytheon provides state-of-the-art electronics, mission systems integration and other capabilities in the areas of sensing; effects; and command, control, communications and intelligence systems, as well as cyber security and a broad range of mission support services. Raytheon is headquartered in Waltham, MA.

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