Violence On The Railways
In the spirit of good news that seems to be burgeoning across this sector of the blogosphere:
Just got word that I am the recipient of a grant covering transportation, living, in-country travel etc, which is nice.
I will be spending six weeks in India working on the topic of the past, present and future of violence on the railway network with private security professionals, IT industry leaders, and occasionally with assorted railway officials.
In trying to stay grounded in the world outlined in Brave New War I will be trying to illustrate the potential effects of systems disruption and working with the team on drawing vectors and mitigating strategies. Not sure if there will be an actual product – may just result in an internal report to guide the thinking of these professionals and executives.
Will have more specifics as I tighten focus. Easy to get lost when you have big ideas, a large budget and 10-15 people on a team. Anyway, May 24-July 8 posting will be sporadic, dependent on Internet access and time.
Niall Ferguson On The Black Swan
Ferguson links Virginia Tech with The Black Swan.
Robert Heinlein on New War
Motivated by Phil’s Heinlein post, a quote I keep around just in case, from Farmer in the Sky:
A police force is all right for stopping individual disturbances; It’s fine for nipping things in the bud. But when the disturbances are planet wide, no police force is big enough, or strong enough, or wise enough. They’ll try, they’ll try bravely. They won’t succeed.
Seems appropriate.
Lone Tech Targets California Power Grid
Register – A reminder as to how pertinent Brave New War is:
According to the feds, Denison became upset last week after a dispute with his employer, Science Applications International. Science Applications provides IT services to ISO.
Denison first attempted a remote attack against the ISO data center on Sunday, but this was unsuccessful. He then reverted to simpler means, and entered the facility physically using his security card key late on Sunday night. Once inside, he smashed the glass plate covering an emergency power cut-off, shutting down much of the data centre through the early hours of Monday morning. This denied ISO access to the energy trading market, but didn’t affect the transmission grid directly. Nor did his emailed bomb threat, delivered later on Monday, though it did lead to the ISO offices being evacuated and control passed to a different facility.