Title: The threat of outsourcing US ports operation to any terrorist country supporter: a case study using fault tree analysis

Authors: Mauricio F. Blos, Hui-Ming Wee, Leopoldo Eduardo Cardenas-Barron

Addresses: Department of Information Science and Control Engineering, Nagaoka University of Technology, Nagaoka, Japan; Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, Chung Yuan Christian University, Chungli, Taiwan, ROC. ' Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, Chung Yuan Christian University, Chungli, Taiwan, ROC. ' Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, Instituto Tecnologico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey, ITESM, Campus Monterrey, Mexico, E. Garza Sada 2501 Sur, CP 64 849 Monterrey, NL, Mexico

Abstract: The possibility of any chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear (CBRN) weapon and/or material to be used in a shipment as a terrorist attack is considered a threat. The objective of this case study is to use fault tree analysis (FTA) to assess the threat to outsource the US ports to any terrorist country supporter. Thus, it was suggested a two-stage process to achieve this: problem formulation to define and rank scenarios, then quantitative risk assessment of selected, more highly ranked, scenarios. The quantitative risk assessment used here is considering two bioterrorist scenarios (projecting the past): the actual 1984 Rajneeshee incident in Oregon and a hypothetical release of oral anthrax into the food supply system. It is worthwhile to highlight that we have demonstrated with the use of FTA that a biological case scenario is possible if a terrorist attack happen.

Keywords: FTA; fault tree analysis; problem formulation; risk assessment; security risk; terrorist attack; outsourcing; US ports; port operations; terrorist support; USA; United States; terrorist threat; bioterrorism.

DOI: 10.1504/IJIDS.2009.027760

International Journal of Information and Decision Sciences, 2009 Vol.1 No.4, pp.411 - 427

Published online: 10 Aug 2009 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article