Cyber Threats to Critical Infrastructure Protection

Social Environments ◽

Public And Private ◽

The Public

The globalisation of the world, and thus indirectly of security, poses serious dilemmas for the modern society about how to continue basing its development on the fundamental requirements related to the free movement of goods, services and people, and, on the other hand, about how to keep threats at an acceptable risk level. The emergence of asymmetric forms of threat to national and international security is based on completely different assumptions and perceptions of the basic concepts of providing security. The changing social conditions and tensions caused by the rapid technological development found particular social environments totally unprepared for confronting the new global security situation and, above all, the newly-emerging complex security threats. The integration of critical infrastructure protection processes into a comprehensive system of national security provision at the national and consequently the international level will be a very demanding project in terms of coordination and awareness of the necessity or regulating that area. In addition, it will represent a very significant shift in the attitude and mentality of all the participants involved. This paper addresses in detail some important dilemmas and factors which have a strong impact on the level of awareness, cooperation and confidence of all partners in the public and private environment that share the need for the protection of critical infrastructure.

Improving The Level of Critical Infrastructure Protection by Developing Resilience

Land Forces Academy Review ◽

10.2478/raft-2018-0028 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 23 (4) ◽

pp. 237-243

Author(s):

Ionuţ Alin Cîrdei

Keyword(s):

Social Life ◽

Critical Infrastructure ◽

Modern Society ◽

Normal Activity ◽

Critical Infrastructures ◽

National Interests ◽

Economic Agents ◽

Cascading Effects

Abstract Modern society is characterized by the increasing interdependence between the actors of the international environment, in the conditions of globalization of all the fields of social life. Increasing interdependencies, together with the emergence of new risks and threats, which attempt to exploit systemic vulnerabilities, which are increasingly numerous and difficult to eliminate, bring a new issue to states and other security environment actors: to ensure the protection the infrastructure elements that are indispensable to the normal activity of the population, economic agents, nongovernmental organizations and state institutions. Critical Infrastructure Protection becomes an important point on the agenda of all decision-makers who are in a position to counter the asymmetric threats that jeopardize national interests and democratic values. Due to the multiplication of risks and threats and the multiplication of interdependencies between the various infrastructure elements, the protection of critical infrastructures can not be achieved effectively only by ensuring their physical protection. The cascading effects of a disturbance can be felt at the level of society as a whole, and it is therefore necessary to address the issue of ensuring the protection of critical infrastructures in a comprehensive manner including infrastructure and community resilience issues.

Minign Critical Infrastructure Information from Municipality Data Sets

Emerging Spatial Information Systems and Applications ◽

10.4018/978-1-59904-075-2.ch014 ◽

2011 ◽

pp. 310-325

Author(s):

William J. Tolone ◽

Wei-Ning Xiang ◽

Anita Raja ◽

David Wilson ◽

Qianhong Tang ◽

...

Keyword(s):

United States ◽

Tacit Knowledge ◽

Critical Infrastructure ◽

Southeastern United States ◽

Public Domain ◽

Data Sets ◽

Domain Experts ◽

The Public

An essential task in critical infrastructure protection is the assessment of critical infrastructure vulnerabilities. The use of scenario sets is widely regarded as the best form for such assessments. Unfortunately, the construction of scenario sets is hindered by a lack in the public domain of critical infrastructure information as such information is commonly confidential, proprietary, or business sensitive. At the same time, there is a wealth of municipal data in the public domain that is pertinent to critical infrastructures. However, to date, there are no reported studies on how to extract only the most relevant CI information from these municipal sources, nor does a methodology exist that guides the practice of CI information mining on municipal data sets. This problem is particularly challenging as these data sets are typically voluminous, heterogeneous, and even entrapping. In this chapter, we propose a knowledge-driven methodology that facilitates the extraction of CI information from public domain, i.e., open source, municipal data sets. Under this methodology, pieces of deep, though usually tacit, knowledge acquired from CI domain experts are employed as keys to decipher the massive sets of municipal data and extract the relevant CI information. The proposed methodology was tested successfully on a municipality in the Southeastern United States. The methodology is considered a viable choice for CIP professionals in their efforts to gather CI information for scenario composition and vulnerability assessment.

On the notion of “Partnership” in Critical Infrastructure Protection

European Journal of Risk Regulation ◽

10.1017/s1867299x00004554 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 6 (2) ◽

pp. 255-262 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Patricia Wiater

Keyword(s):

National Security ◽

Critical Reflection ◽

Critical Infrastructure ◽

National Strategy ◽

The Public ◽

Political Approach ◽

Market Intervention ◽

Industry Associations

This article is a critical reflection on the manifoldness of the notion of “partnership” in Critical Infrastructure Protection. It is argued that the partnership arrangement can be a promising political approach to CIP if the details of public-private cooperation – that is: the participants, the duration, the responsibilities and duties, as well as possible financial compensation – are formalized. Illusionary ideas of a “partner-like” relationship between the public and the private, such as those laid down in the German “National Strategy for Critical Infrastructure Protection”, are, however, doomed to fail. State authorities have to actively offer binding regulatory arrangements to private CI firms in order to establish which companies genuinely agree to cooperate – and which do not. Due to the state's constitutional obligation to guarantee national security and protect the life and health of its citizens, introducing legal requirements is the only possible reaction to a company's refusal to cooperate. In order to avoid overly intrusive market intervention, the state's offer to private firms or their industry associations to conclude binding regulatory contracts on CIP matters may serve as a promising compromise between a laissez-faire approach and regulation.