The nominees included federal employees that used data innovation to track Zika, developed air traffic control systems for drones and mitigated the impact of WannaCry.

Sharing cyberthreat information between public and private sector partners is becoming the prescription for the Department of Health and Human Services.

Margie Graves credits the 2015 project with boosting agencies' basic cyber-hygiene and limiting WannaCry from wreaking havoc on federal agencies.

Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., wrote to federal officials this week asking for details about how agencies patched their systems to protect against the WannaCry ransomware.