From 350+ applications to one champion: School of Cyber Defense final stage at GISEC GLOBAL 2026

The second edition of the School of Cyber Defense competition concluded its final stage at GISEC GLOBAL 2026 in Dubai Expo City. This year's event saw a significant increase in scale and difficulty compared to its debut in 2025. The competition, organized by Techfirm and hosted by the Dubai Electronic Security Center (DESC), required participants to not only defend systems but also create functional solutions to real-world industry challenges.

Over 350 applications poured in from over 30 universities across the UAE, with only the top seven teams advancing to the live finals.

The competition comprised three stages: qualification, case challenge, and live final. In the qualification round, more than 300 students from over 90 teams completed an automated, scenario-based test. Over 90% of active teams scored above the 70% threshold to progress. The case challenge phase involved over 70 teams submitting solutions to one of 15 official challenge briefs.

An expert jury evaluated each submission based on its relevance to the brief, the presence of a working prototype, technical depth, and innovation. Ultimately, only seven teams with the highest scores progressed to the live final stage, where they presented and defended their solutions before the jury.

The winning teams were Unlisted from Middlesex University Dubai in first place, AUSec from American University of Sharjah in second place, and ADPoly CyberGuard from Abu Dhabi Polytechnic securing the third spot. The competition offered a prize pool of AED 55,000, shared among the winning teams. Supporting partners, including AMD, Dahua Technology, Kaspersky, KERNO, M1 Global Infrastructure, Anker Innovations, Circularo, HPE, Huawei, KnowBe4, RAS Infotech, Spire Solutions, and Secureway, contributed to making this event possible.

With its second edition, the School of Cyber Defense has established itself as an annual platform for the UAE's future cybersecurity professionals to showcase their skills against real industry demands.