1 2 Konstantine V. Frolov and Gregory B. Baecher 1 2 Director of the
Institute for Machine Sciences, RAS; and University of Maryland The
objective of the Workshop on Protection of Civilian Infrastructure From
Acts of Terrorism was to lay the foundation for a risk-informed - proach
to modeling, analyzing, predicting, managing, and controlling mul-
sector Infrastructure networks in the face of human threats and errors.
The goal was to combine the insights of a spectrum of disciplines across
en- neering, public policy, planning, and economics. The workshop
addressed the need to develop an understanding for s- tems behaviors and
vulnerabilities of interacting networks; create a ri- informed analysis
capability for modeling and predicting the behavior of complex networks;
apply emerging technology to the problems of desi- ing, constructing,
monitoring, and operating critical infrastructure; and build an
understanding of the social, economic, and environmental factors that
affect, and are affected by, critical infrastructure. The objective was
to develop an understanding of the vulnerability of critical systems to
various modes of terrorist attack. The benefit of developing such
understanding is that approaches can be crafted to reducing
vulnerability and to containing or limiting the propagation of failure
within an infrastructure system, thus limiting the impact of terrorism.
This also leads to improved understanding of infrastructure systems in
general, not only in the face of threats but also natural hazards. Areas
of research need and capability were identified, along with
opportunities for future exchange and collaboration.