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On Campus
Session Date-Application DeadlineProgram Fee$9,900Faculty ChairProgram Director
For information about requirements to participate in an executive program on the Harvard Kennedy School campus, please visit this page.
Program Fee: The program fee includes tuition, housing, curricular materials and most meals
Executive Certificate: This program is a core program in the Public Policy concentration. This program can also be used as a third program for any concentration in the Executive Certificate series.
Executive Core Qualifications (ECQs): This program aligns with one or more Executive Core Qualifications. -
Online
Session Date-Application DeadlineProgram Fee$4,800Faculty ChairProgram Director
Executive Certificate: This program is a core program in the Public Policy concentration. This program can also be used as a third program for any concentration in the Executive Certificate series.
Executive Core Qualifications (ECQs): This program aligns with one or more Executive Core Qualifications.
Program Overview
Individuals and institutions are increasingly vulnerable to cyberattacks, such as network-based intrusions that disrupt productivity, jeopardize privacy and threaten national security. Smart and informed security of critical infrastructure and technology requires constant vigilance against cyber threats.
Cybersecurity: The Intersection of Policy and Technology is an executive program designed to focus on the intersection of policy and technology and how, together, they can address the critical threats of a cyber world. The objective is to bring together technologists and policymakers and provide them with a conceptual framework for the design of both cybersecurity policy and technology.
PROGRAM CURRICULUM
This intensive week-long program is led by a team of Harvard faculty members, policymakers, and leading practitioners in the field of cybersecurity, many of whom advise governments, agencies and industries around the world.
The Cybersecurity: The Intersection of Policy and Technology curriculum explores:
- Technical and policy aspects of security, surveillance and conflict
- Skills applicable to other situations in which policy and technology interact
- Techniques of risk analysis and threat-modeling applicable to a broad set of problem
Lectures and case studies drawn from recent events will bring focus to issues at the intersection of cyber policy and technology. At the same time, group sessions will enable you to engage directly with the issues, solve problems and discuss how insights and cybersecurity measures can be applied in your own country or organization.
Learning Objectives
The Cybersecurity program will give you:
- A deeper understanding of the technical basics of cyberspace and the cyber issue
- An exploration of the nature of emergent and future cyber threats
- The tools to frame and evaluate strategies and policy responses to these threats
- Professional skill-building through group work and scenario assessment
- A lasting network of cyber strategy and policy professionals on whom you can call for support
Application Information
Cybersecurity is designed for a broad range of policy actors and technology experts from around the world who play strategic decision-making roles in both public and private organizations.
Recommended applicants include:
- Technologists developing new applications and frameworks that will need to detect, withstand and counteract intrusion
- Executives in city, state, and federal government agencies and the military involved in the oversight of technology and creation of policy
- Business executives who need to balance an open environment for innovation with the protection of intellectual property
- Private- and public-sector legal experts challenged with codifying the law and understanding its limits
- Diplomatic officials and members of international governments working to establish accepted cybersecurity norms and establish treaties
No computer science background is required.
Faculty Chair Jim Waldo created the Cybersecurity online program curriculum to fit an interactive virtual format while maintaining the main objectives of the on-campus program: how policy and technology, together, can address critical threats of the cyber world. Both online and on-campus formats will include lectures and breakout group work that address technical and policy aspects of cybersecurity.
- The intensive online program provides a more flexible format where you can apply concepts directly to your work while experiencing the rigor of Harvard remotely. The schedule includes 3-4 hours of live sessions each day. Access a sample online program schedule.
- The on-campus program is an immersive and intense learning experience on Harvard’s historic Cambridge campus. During the week, you’ll experience lectures firsthand and connect with peers both in and outside of the classroom. The fee includes tuition, housing, curricular materials, and most meals. Access a sample on-campus program schedule.
WHAT PARTICIPANTS ARE SAYING
“Harvard Kennedy School is a place where we can discuss and learn from each other. The best part is, this experience is not limited to what some of the amazing professors are teaching, but also what the cohort shares with each other.”
SINAN ERAYDIN, PRESIDENT, CYBERMAGUS LLC
Hear From the Faculty Chair
Professor Jim Waldo discusses the Harvard Kennedy School Executive online program, Cybersecurity: The Intersection of Policy and Technology.
Faculty & Research

James Waldo






Susan Hennessey


Susan Landau

Dr. Herbert Lin

Eric Rosenbach

Bruce Schneier

David E. Sanger
Hear from Cybersecurity Alumni
Learn more about Cybersecurity: The Intersection of Policy and Technology from past participants of the program.