Assessing the risk of a nuclear power plant in a terrorist attack. Application of physical protection systems. Ray-tracing technology optimization techniques

Terrorism today is one of the main threats to human civilization. In recent years, international terror has proved its extreme cruelty, its readiness to stop at nothing in order to achieve its goals. As a result of committing terrorist acts, innocent people, children, women and old people suffer. For a terrorist, human life has no value. With the modern variety of potentially dangerous objects and their functional orientation, it is impossible to ensure safety with standard solutions, using uniform strategies, tactical schemes and techniques, and the same type of equipment. If we simply follow the path of ensuring the maximum level of safety, it may turn out that at most facilities the cost of the applied technological means will be many times greater than the cost of the technological equipment of the facility and even the facility itself. Hence, it follows that in order to create effective physical protection systems or to effectively modernize existing physical protection systems, it is necessary to analyze these systems, to identify the weakest and most protected places that need strengthening. At the same time, an important difference must be taken into account between physical protection systems and other safety systems used to protect against natural disasters (such as earthquakes, floods, tornadoes, hurricanes, etc.) and against abnormal operating conditions (such as fire, malfunctions in electrical equipment, etc.). Unlike human violators, security breaches are subject to strict laws and do not happen without reason. For example, the fire of a fire can only burn while there is fuel and oxygen. If one of these elements is removed, the fire will go out. Also, a fire cannot decide where and when it will occur, and how it will progress. Conversely, the human adversary (intruder) has the ability to decide whether to attack, when and how to attack, can adjust to the measures of the physical protection system to counter it, and possibly even outwit and defeat them. All this introduces a significant element of uncertainty into the process of analyzing and evaluating the effectiveness of the physical protection system. Taking into account the above, the task of developing a methodological approach to risk assessment when committing a terrorist attack using physical protection systems, taking into account the optimization of calculations of cost-intensive algorithms in real time, becomes more and more urgent. In this article, the authors attempt to create this approach.

Components of physical security risk

The article considers the existing methods of risk analysis in the design of physical protection systems. It is noted that in the expert method vulnerability assessed integrally, that does not guarantee the principle of equal strength, vulnerability elements of physical protection are considered without regard to the vulnerability of the object itself, and parameters of the model of the intruder, not taking into account such factors as catalysts and inhibitors of the threat. Noted that to improve the adequacy of physical protection required the formation of a databank of security threats and vulnerabilities.