Market Impact on IT Security Spending
研究了竞争企业间IT安全投资决策的相互影响，利用直接和交叉风险弹性描述客户对安全事件的反应，发现最优支出和合作意愿取决于客户反应的性质。
ABSTRACT Traditionally, IT security investment decisions are made in isolation. However, as firms that compete for customers in an industry are closely interlinked, a macro perspective is needed in analyzing these decisions. We utilize the notions of direct‐ and cross‐risk elasticity to describe the customer response to adverse IT security events in the firm and competitor, respectively, thus allowing us to analyze optimal security investment decisions. Examining both symmetric and asymmetric duopoly cases using a continuous‐time Markov chain (CTMC) model, we demonstrate that optimal IT security spending, expected firm profits and willingness of firms to cooperate on security improvements are highly dependent on the nature of customer response to adverse events. We also examine the investment problem when security attacks on different firms are correlated.