Toward a Target-Specific Method of Threat Assessment

Abstract

The threat assessment model used here has been used by researchers at ICT to estimate the “attractiveness” of specific facilities to terrorist organizations. The model uses on-site evaluations of vulnerabilities to build a portfolio of possible attack scenarios. These scenarios are then analyzed using known or estimated sensitivities and target-assessment criteria for the different organizations. The result is a means of rating the different scenarios according to their attractiveness to different types of organization. This enables decision-makers to concentrate resources on most probably scenarios, rather than on worst-case scenarios. The model has provided credible results for actual venues.