If I were to capture the essence of my work in a newspaper headline, I’d say…

“Davidson helps make cyberspace safe for everyone.“

Background

Jack Davidson graduated from Southern Methodist University with a BAS and MS in Computer Science. He received his PhD from the University of Arizona in 1981. He joined the UVA Department of Computer Science as an Assistant Professor in 1982. His current research efforts address the pressing issue of securing our nation’s critical infrastructure. A significant contribution to the field of cybersecurity was the development of automated software transformations to prevent cybersecurity attacks using artificial diversity.

Davidson is a Fellow of the ACM, a Life Fellow of the IEEE, and twice a Commonwealth Cyber Initiative Fellow. In the last five years, Professor Davidson has led $18M in funded cybersecurity research. He currently serves as the Chair of ACM’s Digital Library Board, and previously he served as Co-Chair of ACM’s Publications Board. In 2024, he received ACM’s Outstanding Contribution to ACM Award for his leadership and contributions to ACM’s publications program. ACM is the world largest scholarly computing society.

He co-authored introductory programming textbooks, C++ Program Design: An Introduction to Object-Oriented Programming, 3rd edition, and Java 5.0 Program Design: An Introduction to Object-Oriented Programming, 2nd edition. In 2008, Davidson was the recipient of the IEEE Taylor L. Booth Education Award, “For sustained effort to transform introductory computer science education through lab-based multimedia pedagogy coupled with examples that attract a diverse student body.”