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Ottawa, Ontario - Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Canada (PSEPC) was recently presented with an Award of Excellence at ESRI Canada's annual ESRI Regional User Conference in Ottawa. Alex Miller, President of ESRI Canada, presented the Award in recognition of PSEPC's efforts in creating a system that assesses the vulnerability of Information Technology (IT) infrastructure to physical threats. More than 200 GIS professionals were on hand for the presentation, which was one of the highlights of the conference.
PSEPC in collaboration with Solana Networks, ESRI Canada and Sombra Labs, developed a system that assesses the vulnerability of Information Technology (IT) infrastructure to physical threats. IT infrastructure is vital to the economy and has been internationally recognized as a key component to National Security. IT infrastructure is vulnerable to physical threats and hazards such as human error, electrical failure, earthquakes, landslides, flooding, terrorist attacks, and weather events. "The Award of Excellence is going to a very deserving organization that is dedicated to developing programs and solutions to ensure the public's safety and security," said Mr. Miller. "Their software based solution supports the monitoring and visualization of IT networks within a GIS. The benefit of this system is that it is now possible to discover and visualize a network overlaid on a geographic map and analyze physical threats to the network. The risk to IT infrastructure from physical or human threats can be greatly reduced. I applaud their efforts." Until now, there were few tools available to assess the effect of earthquakes, weather events, terrorist attacks, and other physical threats on IT infrastructure. PSEPC's solution is capable of showing how threats to a geographic area will impact IT infrastructure. The system enables users to perform line of site analysis for wireless network components, network vulnerability analysis, forecast threats to networks, and assess topological relations between network components and other features (e.g. routers and buildings, fiber optics and electrical grids). The system can simulate the impact that a local electrical grid failure will have on national network services allowing for a suitable mitigation strategy to be implemented. Furthermore, the system can review historical weather event data and develop a threat analysis model that will show locations where IT infrastructure would be at the highest risk of failure from severe weather. It is also possible to simulate the effects of human error or terrorist incidents to networks. About Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Canada:
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