{"id":109764,"date":"2020-05-25T12:15:14","date_gmt":"2020-05-25T16:15:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ucf.edu\/news\/?p=109764"},"modified":"2025-06-17T14:40:44","modified_gmt":"2025-06-17T18:40:44","slug":"ucf-cybersecurity-competition-team-places-2nd-at-national-championship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ucf.edu\/news\/ucf-cybersecurity-competition-team-places-2nd-at-national-championship\/","title":{"rendered":"UCF Cybersecurity Competition Team Places 2nd at National Championship"},"content":{"rendered":"
UCF\u2019s Collegiate Cybersecurity Competition Team finished runner-up at the 15th annual National Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition, sponsored by Raytheon, the world\u2019s largest competition of its kind.<\/p>\n
UCF has appeared at the finals in seven of the last eight years and has placed either first or second in all but one.<\/p>\n
\u201cI couldn\u2019t be prouder of this year\u2019s team,\u201d says Tom Nedorost \u201902MS<\/strong>, who serves as the team\u2019s coach and faculty advisor the student cybersecurity club, Hack@UCF. \u201cThis is an amazing achievement and a testament to the long hours of practice the students put into preparing for this competition.\u00a0Considering that UCF does not yet offer a cybersecurity degree, the team\u2019s top finish is even more impressive.\u201d<\/p>\n Ten teams from across the United States advance to nationals where a simulated cyberattack is staged against a fictional business network. The teams are scored on their ability to detect and respond to outside threats, keep services such as mail servers and web servers operational, and respond to routine business requests.<\/p>\n Organized by the Center for Infrastructure Assurance and Security (CIAS) at the 海角直播 of Texas San Antonio, the competition is usually held in April. However, due to COVID-19, this year\u2019s event was postponed to allow the organizers time to reengineer the competition as a virtual event with student teams all competing remotely from the their homes.<\/p>\n \u201cI am overwhelmed by the amount of effort this year’s team has put into the competition.\u201d \u2014 Michael Roberts \u201919<\/strong>, team captain<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Team captain and digital forensics<\/a> graduate student Michael Roberts \u201919<\/strong>, who has competed for four years, says this year\u2019s remote format presented unique challenges, namely connectivity issues that he says do not occur in the on-site competition. He says maintaining focus despite the ongoing pandemic was also difficult.<\/p>\n \u201cI am overwhelmed by the amount of effort this year’s team has put into the competition,\u201d says Roberts, who earned a bachelor\u2019s degree in information technology<\/a> in 2019. \u201cI believe that we performed very well despite the circumstances. I applaud the work of CIAS and their team in hosting the competition virtually. I also look forward to the competition returning to a traditional format.\u201d<\/p>\n Nedorost says the team practiced for the competition remotely since spring break after UCF shifted to remote instruction for the remainder of the semester. Students were stationed in Michigan, South Carolina and scattered across Florida.<\/p>\n The field originally began with more than 250 university teams who squared off through regional competitions across the country.\u00a0From 2013-19, UCF qualified for the national competition by way of the Southeast regional competition, placing first\u00a0in the region in all but one of the years.\u00a0In 2020, UCF petitioned to move to the At-Large Region, which is held virtually, due to the registration and travel costs involved in participating in the Southeast regional.<\/p>\n The team won the At-Large Region in March, which secured its berth to the national competition. Virginia won the national competition for the third year in a row.<\/p>\n This year\u2019s squad included 11 students from the College of Engineering and Computer Science<\/a>: Michael Roberts; information technology<\/a> majors Martin Roberts, Michael Troisi, Ryan Carnovsky and Julian Gonzaelz; computer science<\/a> majors Alexander Cote, Burnett Honors Scholars James Simmons and Aiden Durand, Christopher Fischer and Nelson Torres.<\/p>\n UCF won the national championship in three consecutive years<\/a> (2014, 2015, 2016) and finished runner-up in 2018 and 2019<\/a>.<\/p>\n