The winners of this year’s inaugural Fortinet Ultimate Fabric Challenge (UFC) Global Championship were honored at our annual customer and partner conference, Accelerate 2022. The Ultimate Fabric Challenge (UFC) is a series of regional cybersecurity skills–based competitions that occur during Fortinet conferences and training events around the world over the course of a year. The winners from each of these regional partner challenges faced off at the UFC Global Championship at Accelerate where first, second, and third prize winners were announced.
The UFC leverages curriculum from the award-winning Fortinet Training Institute, which is made up of various programs — including the NSE Certification program — focused on closing the cybersecurity skills gap.
Competition Details
After a very competitive and close competition, Ben Le Huray from Ingram Micro Australia (who is based in Sydney, Australia) came in first place, capturing the top spot in the UFC Global Championship. In addition to bragging rights, Ben received a first-place gold medal and $10,000 (USD). Second and third place winners, Rafael Rosseto dos Santos from Protega Security Consulting based in Brazil and Bart Sikkes from Pinewood, based in the Netherlands, received silver and bronze medals, respectively, and cash prizes. All three winners are NSE level 7 certified and attribute their expertise and knowledge to hours of training and preparation.
The UFC is accessible to partners through Fortinet’s XPERTS Summits that take place around the world and virtually. Each XPERTS Summit competition acts as a qualifying event for the UFC Global Championship. The top-finishing teams in the four regions of North America, APAC, LATAM, and EMEA are acknowledged during each summit and invited to participate in the annual global competition.
In the competitions that lead up to the UFC Global Championship, small teams of two play against the clock and against other teams to complete several technical cybersecurity challenges presented to them in a “capture-the-flag-style” competition. Each team is required to securely deploy Fortinet Security Fabric core products into a modelled customer network
Upskilling Security Professionals Through the UFC
The Ultimate Fabric Challenge helps provide a forum for individuals who have invested time and effort to become skilled with Fortinet products to demonstrate their expertise to a wider audience. Participants use their skills and knowledge of Fortinet products to solve a series of objectives in a limited amount of time. In addition to Security Fabric products, the competition contains other “levels” (sets of objectives) covering important areas, such as SD-WAN, incident response, zero-trust network access, and others.
Narrowing the Skills Gap With the Fortinet Training Institute
The UFC is designed to support the larger Fortinet mission of closing the cybersecurity skills gap through the promotion of continued cybersecurity education and best practices. The Fortinet Training Institute provides certification and training in the growing field of cybersecurity through its programs, including the NSE Certification program, Academic Partner program, and Education Outreach program, which includes a focus on veterans. Fortinet is committed to closing the cyber skills gap through its TAA initiative and Training Institute programs, with a pledge to train 1 million professionals by 2026.
Learn more about Fortinet’s efforts in closing the cybersecurity skills gap: Skills Gap Perspectives.
Learn more about the Fortinet free cybersecurity training initiative and Fortinet’s Training Institute, including the NSE Certification program, Academic Partner program, and Education Outreach program which includes a focus on Veterans.