Evolution of Cybersecurity Concerns: A Systematic Literature Review

This paper provides a systematic literature review of cybersecurity concerns in public administration scholarship. The main intent is to outline the major shifts in the cybersecurity issues faced by public and nonprofit sectors. We undertake this exercise also to identify the future research agenda of emerging cybersecurity research gaps. Our principal finding from the literature is that public administration scholars and practitioners have not given attention to cyber-security until recently. Cyber-security did not emerge as a significant theme until the mid-2000s. There is a dichotomy in treating cyber-security as a technical problem or a management problem. Public administration scholars deemed cyber-security presumably as a technical problem, even though security policies have been in effect since the mid-1980s. The technical concerns have evolved from that of individual computer problems (e.g., viruses) to that of systemic network problems (e.g., ransomware attacks). Recent publications are showing the consideration of cyber-security as a management problem. Even so, the literature shows that cyber-security is not often on the radar screen of public administrators. We argue that our future research should focus on the administrative dimensions of cybersecurity. In this context, emerging research needs to focus on leadership awareness, budgetary allocation, and cyber insurance policies.