SBES TWC: Phase: Small: Protecting the Bazaar: The Ecology of Cybersecurity in Weakly Fortified Networks

虽然近年来对网络攻击的政策兴趣和实证研究都大幅增加，但很少有人关注活跃运行的计算机网络的本地生态。在提出的研究中，我们将重点放在市集计算环境（即弱加固的计算机网络，其中各种各样的用户在很大程度上不受监管的环境中以最低的安全性从事一系列活动）上，并寻求回答三个广泛的研究问题：(1)市集环境中的用户是否可以接受教育，以从事风险较小的在线行为？(2)是否可以通过可用的选项阻止集市环境中的黑客？(3)如果可以教育用户并阻止黑客，那么在弱防御环境中，IT管理可以最大限度地教育用户并阻止黑客的最佳环境是什么？拟议的研究代表了犯罪学家、心理学家和计算机安全专家之间的合作，并将评估网络空间中的犯罪学理论，除了调查数据和实验设计之外，还将使用从组织网络的实时运行中提取的详细网络和目标计算机数据。这个项目的一个主要目标是朝着一个新的综合社会科学视角来看待网络犯罪。实现这种整合的途径是通过本地计算环境的社会生态。这里提出的研究同时考察了用户——受害者、罪犯——黑客和他们交互的计算环境的特征，将为整合这些情境组件提供难得的机会。除了提供犯罪学理论的新见解外，拟议的研究还将提供在弱强化计算环境下黑客和用户互动的详细信息。更广泛的影响我们相信，我们的网络安全生态方法将通过识别那些阻止特别可能导致攻击的受害者行为并阻止攻击者进行恶意活动的系统配置，为改善在线安全的方法提供有用的见解。在运行的计算机环境中汇集来自潜在受害者和罪犯的信息，将允许开发更有效的安全程序和策略，并有可能增加计算机系统的安全性，并增强用户对其系统和网络环境的信心和信任。

While policy interest and empirical research on cyber attacks have both increased substantially in recent years, very little attention has been focused on the local ecology of actively operating computer networks. In the research proposed we focus on a bazaar computing environment (i.e. weakly fortified computer networks where a wide variety of users engage in a range of activities with minimal security in largely unregulated settings) and seek to answer three broad research questions: (1) can users within bazaar environments be educated to engage in less risky on-line behavior? (2) can hackers within bazaar environments be deterred through available options? and (3) if users can be educated and hackers can be deterred what is the optimal environment in which IT management can maximize education of users and deterrence of hackers within weakly fortified environments? The proposed research represents a collaboration between criminologists, psychologists, and computer security experts and will evaluate criminological theories within cyberspace using, in addition to survey data and experimental design, detailed network and target computer data drawn from the real time operation of an organization network. Intellectual Merit A major goal of this project is to move toward a new integrated social science perspective on cybercrime. The pathway to such integration is through the social ecology of a local computing environment. The research proposed here, which simultaneously examines the characteristics of users-victims, offenders-hackers and the computing environment where they interact, will provide a rare opportunity to integrate these situational components. In addition to providing new insights into criminology theory, the proposed research will provide detailed information on the interaction of hackers and users within the context of a weakly fortified computing environment.Broader Impact We believe that our ecological approach to cyber security will offer useful insights for ways of improving online security by identifying those system configurations that discourage victim behaviors that are especially likely to result in attacks and deter attackers from malicious activities. Bringing information together from potential victims and offenders within the world of an operating computer environment will allow the development of more efficient safety programs and strategies and has the potential to increase the security of computer systems and strengthen users' confidence and trust in their systems and the cyber environment more generally.