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Consequence-, time- and interdependency-based risk assessment in the field of critical infrastructure

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Abstract

The disruption of any critical infrastructural sector has the potential to create significant direct consequences and cross-sectoral effects in a short period of time. In this article, we suggest a consequence-, time- and interdependency-based risk assessment approach that seeks to identify which direct consequences and intersectoral effects are likely to emerge in what time frame. We argue that critical infrastructures with the capacity to cause the greatest societal consequences and strongest intersectoral negative effects in the shortest time represent the most risky infrastructures. Such a direct risk assessment was further improved by a network-based risk calculation that takes not only first-order effects into account, but also the n-order intersectoral cascading effects. Applying this model to 17 infrastructural subsectors in Slovenia shows that the network transfer of effects among critical infrastructures can considerably and unpredictably change their initially calculated risk. The riskiest subsectors at the maximal level of network effects turned out to be those on which other subsectors heavily directly and indirectly depend: electricity, ICT, road transport and financial instruments. Risk management in the critical infrastructure protection field and related defence in depth should focus its limited resources on those infrastructures with the biggest network-based risk.

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Notes

  1. In the case of Italy, the whole country was affected except for the islands. In the other case, Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, New York, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey and even Ontario were affected by the massive blackout.

  2. A normalized dependency matrix is obtained by dividing all values by 4 to obtain a scale from 0 to 1.

  3. α can at most be 1/λ, where λ is the highest eigenvalue of the N matrix. Higher values could lead to negative risks.

  4. The process of designing the questionnaire was based on preliminary theoretical studies of critical infrastructure, case studies of other countries, and EU policy in this field. The first version of the questionnaire was tested by our academic colleagues for its clarity and methodological consistency and also commented on by the (subsectoral) experts from practice. These comments confirmed the empirical usability of the questionnaire and led us to adapt some questions. The three questions on consequences, time effects and interdependency were closed and quantitative, whereas the remaining questions (not part of this article) were predominantly qualitative and open (see Prezelj et al, 2012).

  5. Larger values would result in negative risk values.

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Acknowledgements

The empirical part of this article was made possible by a grant from the Slovenian Research Agency and the Ministry of Defense (project title: Definition and Protection of Critical Infrastructures, CRP M5-0159). We are grateful for the comments on early drafts provided by Rae Zimmerman, Andrej Blejec, Alain de Beuckelaer and the two anonymous reviewers.

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Correspondence to Iztok Prezelj.

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The article was presented in 2011 at the twentieth SRA-Europe Meeting in Stuttgart.

Appendices

Appendix A

Table A1

Table A1 Categories and scales for assessing the direct consequences of a subsectoral malfunction (European Commission, 2006; The Council Of The European Union, 2008, p. 78)

Appendix B

Table B1

Table B1 Workshops and participating experts

Appendix C

Figure C1

Figure C1
figure 5

Direct risk in relation to estimated consequences, time and cross-sectoral influences.

Appendix D

Table D1

Table D1 Network-based risks at different α's (with ranks in brackets)

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Prezelj, I., Žiberna, A. Consequence-, time- and interdependency-based risk assessment in the field of critical infrastructure. Risk Manag 15, 100–131 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1057/rm.2013.1

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