Networks, Security and Complexity: The Role of Public Policy in Critical Infrastructure Protection

The end of the 20th century witnessed an information revolution that introduced a host of new economic efficiencies. This economic change was underpinned by rapidly growing networks of infrastructure that have become increasingly complex. In this new era of global security we are now forced to ask whether our private efficiencies have led to public vulnerabilities, and if so, how do we make ourselves secure without hampering the economy. In order to answer these questions, Sean Gorman provides a framework for how vulnerabilities are identified and cost-effectively mitigated, as well as how resiliency and continuity of infrastructures can be increased. Networks, Security and Complexity goes on to address specific concerns such as determining criticality and interdependency, the most effective means of allocating scarce resources for defense, and whether diversity is a viable strategy. The author provides the economic, policy, and physics background to the issues of infrastructure security, along with tools for taking first steps in tackling these security dilemmas. He includes case studies of infrastructure failures and vulnerabilities, an analysis of threats to US infrastructure, and a review of the economics and geography of agglomeration and efficiency. This critical and controversial book will garner much attention and spark an important dialogue. Policymakers, security professionals, infrastructure operators, academics, and readers following homeland security issues will find this volume of great interest.

Table of Contents:
Contents: 1. Setting the Stage 2. Private Efficiencies and Public Vulnerabilities 3. Is There a Threat? 4. Literature Review of Conceptual Framework 5. The Vulnerability of Networks and the Resurrection of Distance 6. Packets and Power: The Interdependency of Infrastructure 7. Allocating Scarce Resources for Network Protection 8. Diversity as Defense 9. Conclusion References Appendix Index

About the Author :
Sean P. Gorman, FortiusOne, US

Review :
'The world is growing more interconnected every day, spun with fiber optic cable, electric power lines, transportation and water networks. Gorman provides a detailed analysis of the pattern of telecommunications networks and their interrelationships with other infrastructure. The work is truly interdisciplinary in scope, and provides planners, policy makers, security analysts, and infrastructure managers and educators in all of these fields with an invaluable resource in terms of a rich database, a methodology, and process for assembling, analyzing and portraying information on key infrastructure assets. This work emphasizes space and place in understanding interconnectivity of physical infrastructure, integrating policy and geography as well as providing an important complement to engineering approaches to interconnected infrastructure. He presents the readers with a broad set of questions and how they can be addressed about threats, risk and vulnerability and policy options for their reduction. This is a rare book of its kind, and joins a growing literature on how complexity is a key factor in understanding and setting policies for the services upon which our society depends.' 'The concepts of Critical Infrastructure Protection are radically redefining the relationship between the public and private sectors in terms of both our national and economic security. Networks, Security and Complexity is a worthy contribution in defining and advancing many of these concepts. The author is among the vanguard of rising young scholars who will assist this nation in thinking through the significant security challenges faced in the age of information and asymmetric threat.' 'This volume on complex networks opens surprising perspectives for the interested reader, either a scientist or a policymaker. It describes and analyzes in a convincing way the significance of critical infrastructures, be it internet or transport connections. Due insight into the existence and emergence of such infrastructures is a prerequisite for an effective security policy. This study presents a model-based, operational framework for identifying critical domains in dynamic networks. The various concepts are illustrated by means of empirical case examples.'