Security and Disaster Response. Putting a little back.

Are we doing it? – Yes we are!

A recent NCSC Tweet said, “The three biggest issues that could affect your businesses are cyber-attacks, civil unrest and flooding.” That got me thinking about the shows my team and I are delivering at the end of this year. 

Cyber-attacks, tick, we are covering that, civil unrest ties in with wider policing issues and tick, we are engaged with policing at every level, so I can confidently say that area is covered.  

Then we come to flooding, in July there were landslides and flooding caused by torrential rain in Japan, killing at least 200 people. An event described by CNN as “one of the deadliest natural disasters to hit the country since the earthquake and tsunami of 2011.”

Not wanting to overly dramatize this but looking at the importance of disasters on the world stage, this is one of the reasons I decided to start a new show to enable a platform to share best practice and innovation to help respond to international disasters.

Looking at international disasters, the past couple of months have been frightening. The rescue of 12 children and their football coach from the flooded depths of the Tham Luang cave system in Thailand, by an international team, was inspiring. The flooding and then heatwave in Japan, the wild fires in the USA and just outside Athens, the ongoing crisis in the Mediterranean, albeit smaller number of migrants flowing into Europe from some of the poorest and most war torn parts of the world, the declaration of the end of another Ebola epidemic, the continuing plight of the Rohingya people from Myanmar seeking refuge in Bangladesh; the toll of human misery and suffering goes on.  

All I want to do with the new International Disaster Response Expo is make a difference, to be able to watch the news and in some little way know my team and I have done something to help. 

Luckily civil unrest is something we are not seeing on our streets just yet but the emotion behind both sides of the BREXIT campaign, the way militant groups can be stirred up rapidly through social media takes on a whole new dimension especially when I read about state manipulation of social media. The whole issue surrounding the influence of ‘Fake News’ brings an added factor to our security thinking and as ever, my team are one step ahead with the leading author JJ Patrick giving his insights into ‘Fake News’, the manipulation of social media and what he describes as the Alternative War, as part of the International Security Expo conference series. 

A continuing theme is looking at how we make our cities safer and the nerve agent attack in Salisbury using military grade Novichok has brought home just how the threat is diversifying. The 1200 police drafted in just to secure the contaminated sites are being slowly replaced by civilian security guards. This incident, that could be from the pages of a John Le Carrie novel, is now a vehicle for greater public private cooperation. There must be lessons we can pull out from it especially in our latest Safer Cities Summit. 

The end of May saw the new GDPR come into force, yet it seems data breaches continue, warnings from the NCSC and others over continuing cyber-attacks abound but the full implication of this new regulation has yet to be discovered. By November at the International Security Expo I am sure it will be discussed in many huddled groups and I know the conference series will provide many insights and tips for those still refining their business processes. 

I have had a sneak peak of much of our conference planning and everything I have mentioned is in there and much, much more. I know I’m biased but I am getting excited at the content for this year’s event. The sad thing is I just want to go to all of the presentations as they sound fascinating and I will happily say that in front of the Human Lie Detector (presenting at the Aviation and Border Security Conference).

I look forward to hearing further NCSC insights at the International Security Expo but what is clear from their comment and what is on the news every night, is the world remains a chaotic place and all I want to do, with my team, is something to help make it a little less chaotic and bring the chance of a little more safety and security.

If I can do that, then it is all worth it and will leave the world a little better for my loved ones!