With the flurry of recent internet hacks, how safe is the information that we post online? Who will develop the innovations needed to secure our data in cyberspace? In a new Baltimore Sun op-ed, bwtech@UMBC Executive Director Ellen Hemmerly writes that the necessary innovation will come from Baltimore, thanks to the city’s proximity to the federal government and major defense and intelligence contractors, high concentration of cybersecurity and IT startups, and early experience with “revolutionary cyber companies.”
“Ultimately, cybersecurity is not just about national security, it’s also about our own economic security,” writes Hemmerly. “We’ve been vulnerable since day one, and what has changed has been the realization of how vulnerable we truly are.”
Hemmerly explains that Baltimore is already home to many innovative cybersecurity firms, and the city is attracting even more early-stage companies from around the nation and the world that want to be near leaders in , IT, security, defense and intelligence companies.
“The University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) ranks fourth among U.S. research universities in information technology degrees and certificates awarded,” Hemmerly writes. “With cybersecurity becoming more interdisciplinary, Maryland has morphed itself into a leading ecosystem for innovation and entrepreneurship in the space.”
Read Hemmerly’s op-ed “A cybersecurity future in Baltimore,” published November 25 in the Baltimore Sun.
Image: Ellen Hemmerly. Photo by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.
