Rohit Valecha, Ph.D.

Associate Professor, Cloud Technology Endowed Fellowship, Information Systems and Cyber Security

Rohit Valecha Headshot

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Bio

Dr. Rohit Valecha is an associate professor in the Department of Information Systems and Cyber Security at The University of Texas at San Antonio. He joined the UTSA faculty in 2016. His Ph.D. is from the University at Buffalo in management science and systems, and his undergraduate in electrical engineering and master’s degree in computer science are also from University at Buffalo.

Dr. Valecha has research interests in social media, crisis response, emergency management, and information security and privacy. In particular, his research utilizes social, psychology and design theories for understanding the role of social media in mitigating large-scale societal disruptions. He also specializes in methodologies using natural language processing, text mining, social network analysis and machine learning. Dr. Valecha has teaching interests in network security, information technology, design science, and business intelligence and analytics.

Dr. Valecha has authored or co-authored more than 75 technical papers. He has published in several top journals, including Management Information Systems Quarterly (MISQ), Journal of the Association for Information Systems (JAIS), IEEE Transactions of Dependable and Secure Computing (IEEE TDSC) and other ACM and IEEE outlets, as well as the Networking and Information Technology Research and Development (NITRD) Program.

Valecha's work has received best paper and other awards at the American Conference on Information Systems (AMCIS), Design Science Research on Information Systems and Technology (DESRIST), Conference on Information Systems and Technology (CIST), Workshop on Information Technology and Systems (WITS) and others. He is also the recipient of Dean's Distinguished Research Award and Provost's Endowed Fellowship.

He is a co-PI on several NSF grants (EAGER, RAPID, SCC and DRMS) and DHS grant, totaling more than $1 million.

He is a part of the Editorial Reviewer Board for Information Systems Research (ISR) Special Issue on Unleashing the Power of Information Technology for Strategic Management of Disasters as well as Early Career Editorial Board for Journal of Strategic Information Systems (JSIS). He is a Coordinating Editor for Information Systems Frontiers (ISF) and has served as ad hoc reviewer for Management Information Systems Quarterly (MISQ), Information Systems Journal (ISJ), European Journal of Information Systems (EJIS), Decision Support Systems (DSS), Information & Management (I&M), Information Systems Frontiers (ISF), Computers and Security (C&S) and other journals.

Research Interests

  • Social media
  • Crisis response
  • Emergency management
  • Security and privacy

Degrees

  • Ph.D. University at Buffalo
  • M.S. University at Buffalo
  • B.S. University at Buffalo

Grants, Patents and Clinical Trials

  • 2021–22: NSF DRMS-DDRIG grant, $29,850, “COVID Vaccine Misinformation Harms: An Investigation of Harm Perceptions and Related Harm Communications on Social Media,” by H. Raghav Rao (PI), Rohit Valecha (Co-PI) and Thi Tran (Co-PI). $29,850.
  • 2021–22: NSF grant #2126504, $150,000, “NSF SCC-PG Grant: Building Resilience During Disasters Through Digital Inclusion of Older Adults: A Smart and Connected Community Research Initiative,” by H. R. Rao (PI), Bijo Mathew (Co-PI), Chris Reddick (Co-PI), David Han (Co-PI) and Rohit Valecha (Co-PI).
  • 2015–20: DHS grant, $895,237, “Analysis and Training in Defense of Biological and Digital Threats,” by Bernard Arulanandam (PI), Nicole Beebe (Co-PI), Rajendra Boppana (Co-PI), Mark Eppinger (Co-PI), Xiaoyin Wang (Co-PI), Palden Lama (Co-PI) and Rohit Valecha (Co-PI).
  • 2016–19: NSF grant #IIS1651475, $199,999, "EAGER: An Investigation of the Propagation of Error-Resistant and Error-Prone Messages Over Large-Scale Information Networks," by H.R. Rao (PI), Manish Agrawal (Co-PI), Varun Chandola (Co-PI) and Rohit Valecha (Co-PI). See Project Details
  • 2016–19: NSF grant #1651060, $100,001, “RAPID: Collaborative Research: Employees' Response to OPM Data Breaches: Decision Making in the Context of Anxiety and Fatigue,” by H. R. Rao (PI), Rui Chen (PI) and Rohit Valecha (Co-PI).

Publications

  • "A Socio-Emotional Perspective of the OPM Data Breach: An Investigation of Public Reaction on Twitter," with E. Bachura, R. Chen, H. R. Rao, Management Information Systems Quarterly, Vol. 46, No. 2, 2022.
  • "Influence in Social Media: An Investigation of Tweets Spanning the 2011 Egyptian Social Movement," with S. Venkatesan, N. Yaraghi, O. Oh and H. R. Rao, Management Information Systems Quarterly, Vo. 45, No. 4, 2021.
  • “Phishing Email Detection using Persuasion Cues,” with P. Mandaokar and H. R. Rao, IEEE Transactions on Dependable and Secure Computing, Vol. 19, No. 2, 2021.
  • "An Activity Theory Approach to Leak Detection and Mitigation in Patient Health Information," with H. R. Rao and S. Upadhyaya, Journal of the Association for Information Systems, Vol. 22, No. 4, 2021.
  • "An Activity Theory Approach to Modeling Dispatch-Mediated Emergency Response Communications," with H. R. Rao, S. Upadhyaya and R. Sharman, Journal of the Association for Information Systems, Vol. 20, No. 1, 2019.