Archives: October, 2008

Here’s an ambitious report on how well the information that underpins government and private security priorities is flowing these days. New Information and Intelligence Needs in the 21st Century Threat Environment, issued by the Henry L. Stimson Center in Washington, looks at information troves in three areas: terrorism, infectious disease and natural hazards. “Each has its […]

We wrote the other day about Twitter, the microblog, serving as a message board for security officers who join the “Security Twits” list. But here’s another use of Twitter with broader application for continuity of operations and public safety. The Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) already updates its Twitter feed with traffic alerts and route […]

Whether it was terrorism or some other form of statement – the Mounties call it “an isolated criminal act – the bombing of a natural gas pipeline in British Columbia shows the difficulty of protecting far-flung facilities like pipelines from attack. Whoever placed the apparent bomb was for real. It produced a crater six feet […]

Don’t know quite where to take this in security terms, but it’s interesting that “homeland security concerns and commuting conditions are creating strong incentives to work away from the office,” says a report on nextgov.com.  Concerns are growing in strategic centers, like Washington, that having employees centralized in a “secure” facility could be counterproductive in […]

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has been wrestling with national security challenges since it was created in November, 2002. By the measure of further terrorist attacks on the homeland – none – it has been doing a decent job.Yet much remains to be understood and organized in a never-ending discipline. Homeland Security Secretary Michael […]

For those of you who don’t know it, check out Security Twits, a running conversation on security needs on Twitter, the microblogging service.  Zach Lanier, who maintains Security Twits, says it has over 230 members from the security field who need to opt-in to join the conversation – that is, they have to want to […]

We provide this release from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) not because its subject – nuclear terrorism – is a workaday threat at most locations, but because security officials need to be mindful that the explosion of nuclear materials is a present danger for someone, somewhere in the world. Alertness is key. In updating […]

Here’s a security technology to watch: Security InfoWatch reports that Animetrics, a New Hampshire company, is marketing a software program that turns an iPhone into a face recognition system. It’s called (you guessed it) iFace. Security officers could use an iPhone to snap pictures and identify people with a face-mapping technology and a Web database. […]