Decision Making and Biases in Cybersecurity Capability Development: Evidence from a Simulation Game Experiment
Description | We developed a simulation game to study the effectiveness of decision-makers in overcoming two complexities in building cybersecurity capabilities: potential delays in capability development; and uncertainties in predicting cyber incidents. Analyzing 1479 simulation runs, we compared the performances of a group of experienced professionals with those of an inexperienced control group. Experienced subjects did not understand the mechanisms of delays any better than in- experienced subjects; however, experienced subjects were better able to learn the need for proactive decision-making through an iterative process. Both groups exhibited similar errors when dealing with the uncertainty of cyber incidents. Our findings highlight the importance of training for decision-makers with a focus on systems thinking skills, and lay the groundwork for future research on uncovering mental biases about the complexities of cybersecurity. |
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Authors | Mohammad S. Jalali, Michael Siegel, Stuart Madnick |
Date Published | Mar 1, 2019 |
PDF Version | decision-making-and-biases-in-cybersecurity.pdf (3.8 MiB) |