Higher Education Gallery

VC and ACE Directors visit to GCHQ

On 25 November 2024, Director GCHQ and the NCSC Academic Engagement team welcomed Vice Chancellors (VCs) and Directors from both our ACEs-CSE and Academic Centres of Excellence in Cyber Security Research (ACEs-CSR) to GCHQ for strategic level talks. Convening such a senior group into the heart of GCHQ was quite the challenge but we were thrilled to achieve our goal.

The role of academic institutions
The NCSC has long recognised the importance of collaborating with these institutions to highlight the critical role that universities and academia play in national security and the prosperity of the UK. Our collaboration presented an opportunity to influence senior stakeholders regarding their institutions' cyber security, by providing them glimpses into national security threat assessments; and them realising there is some serious work to be done to protect their own institutions.

One VC remarked:

“The meetings with yourself and senior colleagues were very informative, that the Director was able to give so much of her time to steer an open conversation was particularly valuable. The day was a great basis for continuing to build and deepen our collaborations”

Anne, Director shared:

“These universities are all at the forefront of cyber security research and education in the UK and are important partners for GCHQ and the NCSC. This meeting highlights how seriously we take this collaboration and has provided a useful opportunity to raise vice-chancellors’ awareness of the cyber threat. We are grateful for their engagement and look forward to continuing this collaboration into the future.” 

Recognising excellence in cyber security
We were also delighted to present a number of awards to our ACE-CSE and CSR Directors in recognition of their institutions’ efforts in building national capability and capacity in cyber security education and research. 

This work is in collaboration with CSE Connect and the Cyber Security Body of Knowledge (CyBOK) amongst others, to build on our existing degree certification programme.

The University of Greenwich achieved notable success in both ACE-CSR and ACE-CSE status this year at the event, and were delighted to receive a double award, celebrating the first time this has been achieved. 

Dr Georgia Sakellari (ACE-CSE Director) and Professor Manos Panaousis (ACE-CSR Director) from the University of Greenwich. 
 

ACE-CSE awards
In our ACE-CSE 2024 cycle, Greenwich were our only new ACE-CSE and awarded silver status; Queen’s University Belfast achieved gold award. In recognition, they were both invited along with other ACE Directors to receive their ACE-CSE certificates by Anne Keast-Butler, Director GCHQ.

Dr Georgia Sakellari – ACE-CSE Director at University of Greenwich receiving her Silver ACE-CSE Certificate.

 

Prof Maire O’Neill - ACE-CSR Director receiving the Gold ACE-CSE award on behalf of Queen’s University Belfast.

The most recent ACE-CSE award winning universities receiving their recognition certificates from Chris Ensor, Deputy Director Cyber Growth at the Education Ecosystem Conference 2024 at The Queens Hotel, Leeds.

GOLD Award received by Mr Rich Macfarlane – ACE-CSE Director representing Edinburgh Napier University.

GOLD Award received by Dr Virginia Franqueira – ACE-CSE Director representing University of Kent.

SILVER Award received by Dr Bertie Müller – ACE-CSE Director Swansea University.

Highlights from the conference.

The 4^th ACE-CSE Director’s Conference was held at the University of the West of England on 1^st July and hosted by Professor Phil Legg.
 

The challenges at Edinburgh were focused on ‘improving cyber security protections and resilience of new space technologies, nanosatellites, ground stations and space IoT as a whole’.