Smith School of Business Professor Lawrence A. Gordon recently co-developed a formula to determine how much a company should invest in cybersecurity. Now, he targets University of Maryland honors students with this innovation. His course, Accounting and Economic Aspects of Cybersecurity, introduces financial management principles to a discipline grounded in computer science and engineering.

College Park, Md. – November 14, 2012 – World-leading cybersecurity researchers at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business won a significant grant from the Department of Homeland Security to develop economic models for cybersecurity investments. Professors Lawrence Gordon and Martin Loeb – along with colleague William Lucyshyn from the School of Public Policy -- received one of just 34 contracts awarded to 29 academic and research institutions for research and development of solutions to cybersecurity challenges.

The Smith School's academic departments and research-focused centers of excellence combine leading scholars and industry veterans who truly understand the importance of risk management. Smith faculty and practitioners explore issues related to how risk impacts financial decisions, supply chains and the broader global economy.

College Park, Md. – January 21, 2009 – The University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business invites innovative solutions to one of the 21st century’s most pressing concerns – how to allocate scarce resources to protect the massive amount of personal and sensitive data available on computer networks and online. The selection committee is now accepting essay submissions for the Gordon Prize in Managing Cybersecurity Resources.

Research by Larry Gordon and Martin Loeb The Sarbanes-Oxley Act has caused an increase in the voluntary disclosure of firms’ information security activities.

Lawrence A. Gordon, Ernst & Young Alumni Professor of Managerial Accounting, and Martin Loeb, professor of accounting and information assurance and Deloitte & Touche Faculty Fellow, are pioneers in the economics and financial management of cybersecurity resources. A brief overview of recent key research is now being made available to Chinese scholars through a translation on Gordon's Web site. It is the pairs first foray to directly connect their counterparts in China with the results of their research.

The security of information is a fundamental concern to organizations operating in the modern digital economy. There are technical, behavioral, and organizational aspects related to this concern. There are also economic aspects of information security. One important economic aspect of information security (including cybersecurity) revolves around deriving the right amount an organization should invest in protecting information. Organizations also need to determine the most appropriate way to allocate such an investment.

The security of information is a fundamental concern to organizations operating in the modern digital economy. There are technical, behavioral, and organizational aspects related to this concern. There are also economic aspects of information security. One important economic aspect of information security (including cybersecurity) revolves around deriving the right amount an organization should invest in protecting information. Organizations also need to determine the most appropriate way to allocate such an investment.

The Fourth Annual Forum on Financial Information Systems & Cybersecurity: A Public Policy Perspective, held on May 23, 2007 at the Robert H. Smith School of Business, brought together experts and industry professionals from around the globe to discuss risk management issues related to information security. The day included expert presentations followed by discussions that ranged from the extremely theoretical to the practical to the purely political, and the issues ranged from personal security risks to corporate and national security risks.