Title: IT enabled counter terrorism infrastructure: issues and challenges

Authors: Syed Ahsan

Addresses: Department of Computer Science and Engineering, University of Engineering and Technology,Lahore, Pakistan

Abstract: In the post 11 September 2001, terrorism has been an immediate and most serious threat to the free world because of its real and potential damage to the infrastructure, economy and people. In response to the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks, developed and developing countries, such as USA and Pakistan, have emerged as front line states in the fight against terrorism with the following objectives: (1) prevent future terrorist attacks, (2) reduce the nations vulnerability and (3) minimise the damage and recovery from attacks that occur. In order to achieve these objectives, we require new approaches to intelligence and information gathering and its analysis through the use of information technology. In this paper, we attempt to identify (1) the areas where IT can contribute in accomplishing these three strategic security objectives, (2) the unique IT problems and challenges in counter terrorism applications where such applications are being used and developed such as in USA and (3) lessons learned for developing countries such as Pakistan, so that an IT counter terrorism infrastructure can be established with minimum cost in terms of time and money.

Keywords: counter terrorism; disaster management; homeland security; biometric technologies; heterogeneous resources; interoperability; electronic security; e-security; intelligence; information gathering; information technology; terrorist attacks; emergency management.

DOI: 10.1504/IJESDF.2007.013597

International Journal of Electronic Security and Digital Forensics, 2007 Vol.1 No.1, pp.117 - 124

Published online: 09 May 2007 *

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