Introduction
Security is a complicated yet essential topic for research for both public and private sector actors. The safety and well-being of the United States depend on the protection of various vital infrastructure. These resources and networks are at the core of the nation’s society and economy. Therefore, to attain resilience, crucial partners of the foundation have to determine the country’s priorities, missions as well as estimate risks by evaluating the current level of development. Thus, learning more about partnership structure, critical industries sector plans, and the SCADA System will help to create a more excellent security framework.
Definition of a Partnership Structure
A partnership structure is defined as the effort of private and public sectors to structure essential security through cooperation, allowing all members to make risk-informed decisions while administering limited resources. The partnership structures are developed to positively influence the participation of the community and permit private owners and their collaborators of important infrastructure (United States Department of Homeland Security, 2013). Moreover, such a structure allows stakeholders from other entities in the United States to participate equally. Voluntary cooperation between the representatives of the private sector, operators, and government parts is considered a primary factor for advancing actions in regards to national security and flexibility.
The government needs to prepare an economic estimation of possible risks. Additionally, while addressing the importance of security, the non-economic factors need to be taken into account, such as the ethics of privacy. An example of partnership structures is sector and cross-sector council structures that include the Federal Senior Leadership Council and more (United States Department of Homeland Security, 2013). Therefore, a lasting partnership should be considered to address both private and state perspectives on security. For instance, a commercial institution might be more tolerant of security risks than the government; however, the cooperation might positively contribute to the national defense.
Sector-Specific Plan for a Critical Infrastructure
Critical infrastructure sectors in the United States are those whose frameworks and systems are regarded as essential because their demolition will have a critical effect on the economic stability and security of the state. Therefore, it is vital to preserving the safety and reliability of these sixteen sectors. The Communications Sector is a significant part of the United States economy, as it is fundamental to the business operations, public safety institutions, and the state (United States Department of Homeland Security, 2015). The sector includes various inputs, such as voice assistance through satellite, physical, and wireless transmission (United States Department of Homeland Security, 2015). Even though the private sector is the leading operator of the communication sector, working with government entities helps both agents to anticipate and permit infrastructure outages. Moreover, the cooperation helps to comprehend the national defense’s ability to use communication resources during unsettling times and contribute to the processes of other sectors.
As communication is considered a critical sector, the United States Department of Security provides a plan for all the partners to collaborate and preserve the safety of this and other structures. The framework incorporate various goals, such as building its resilience, diversity, preventing excessiveness, and ensuring fast recovery in case of failure (United States Department of Homeland Security, 2015). Various other sectors rely on the Communication part, such as emergency and financial survival, as well as energy, IT, and transportation (United States Department of Homeland Security, 2015). For instance, the emergency services are dependent on the emergency operation communication structure, phone, land, and radio systems, public warning networks, and emergency calls.
SCADA System
Supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) is a modern control structure used in various industries, including communication, emergency, energy, water, and more. The core of the system is a central network that controls and oversees sites, such as infrastructural plants across the United States (Krambeck, 2015). SCADA operates by navigating the indicators that communicate through channels and granting individuals the ability to control remotely any machinery in a preferred system (Krambeck, 2015). Moreover, it allows access to a tag database with direct points of the facility. SCADA often did not prioritize security, which contributed to the system’s openness to attacks. After years of working on improvement, SCADA remains unsafe against terror attacks due to a “huge lack of authentication in the design and operation of some existing SCADA networks” (Krambeck, 2015, para. 6). Overall, as it is used to control various vital sectors of infrastructure, the security protection for SCADA should be improved as its failure may result in problems within different social areas.
Conclusion
To summarise, the network responsible for managing the safety of critical infrastructure sectors is broad, as it includes cooperation and partnership of various subjects. The collaboration should combine Federal and local Governments, regional institutions, NGOs, and scholars. The partnership will allow for improvements in managing various safety threats, including cyber-attacks and more. Partnership structures enable private and public sectors to be informed about decisions that each party takes regarding the allocation of sacred resources. Moreover, critical infrastructure industries are interconnected; therefore, each system’s safety is as it helps preserve the overall national security. Lastly, the SCADA system is widely used for managing the plants in the United States; however, a lack of renovation makes it vulnerable to terrorist attacks.
References
Krambeck, D. (2015). An introduction to SCADA systems – technical articles. All About Circuits. Web.
United States Department of Homeland Security. (2015) Communications sector-specific plan an annex to the NIPP 2013.
United States Department of Homeland Security. (2013). National infrastructure protection plan 2013: Partnering for critical infrastructure security and resilience. Web.