Who Protects Cyberspace?

The evolution of Internet security has been largely driven by market demand and has developed in the absence of formal direction. Although not a pure public good, Internet security has strong public good characteristics. While standard economic theory dictates that such goods must to be provided by government, the authors observe the private provision of Internet security by the market. In this working paper, Coyne and Leeson consider the public good characteristics of Internet security and the means through which this security is provided on the market, as well as potential limitations on both the private and public provision of cyber security.