Improve Resiliency

By Jeff Frazier, Global Justice and Public Safety Director, Cisco Internet Business Solutions Group, and Norm Jacknis, State and Local Government Director, Cisco Internet Business Solutions Group

Perhaps the only good things to emerge from tragedies are the lessons we learn about preparing for a future crisis.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) expanded its charter to include locating missing adults. In coordination with other agencies, NCMEC opened a communication center to field inquiries about the storm victims. The call center operated on a time-division multiplexing (TDM) network, however, and could not easily access third-party information. Initially, only about one-third of inbound callers learned the whereabouts of their family or friends.

Thinking about the problem differently and using new IP technology offered an answer.

When the NCMEC moved to an IP platform, it could scan hundreds of missing persons’ messages on bulletin boards on the web. In some cases, representatives would:

• Receive a call from a worried relative
• Quickly locate their loved one
• Connect the two by phone

The success rate in locating the missing nearly tripled.

Technology is not the hero here, but in many emergency situations it can facilitate a quick, coordinated response. Having assisted in recovery from several disasters and preparation for countless others, we know that it is nearly impossible to imagine every possible scenario. Yet, as public and private sector IT leaders, you should begin an ongoing dialogue with your management, colleagues, and customers. As you start these conversations, here are three of the many things to consider.

1. Facilitate collaboration among different jurisdictions.

Collaboration is the lifeblood of emergency preparedness. A common misconception is that when a disaster hits, everyone will convene at the physical location of the incident commander. In reality, people tend to stay where they are and must be connected virtually. Although responders may not be in the same room, building, or even city, the level of trust among them must be the same as if they were standing side by side. All levels of government agencies and private companies must be able to:

• Talk with one another
• See one another
• Share documents
• Have a clear view of data to support their decision making

This requires planning and implementing a network architecture before disaster hits.

When Hurricane Katrina struck, the chief information officer (CIO) for the city of New Orleans lost communications with his team. He went to a local electronics store and acquired an Internet router, which he plugged it into a nearby hotel room jack. Only then did he learn that an IP telephony system would be his mechanism to help with emergency coordination. Yes, people innovate during emergencies. But they will innovate more quickly and smartly with the appropriate tools at their disposal.

2. Communicate with the public.

Often in a disaster, little can be done other than communicate, and two-way communication is paramount. Giving citizens, employees, and customers information and guidance instills calm and clarity. You need to reach out to:

• Ensure people’s safety
• Assess a situation
• Keep people informed

Our natural instinct is to pick up the phone, but phone lines often become overloaded and stop working. Governments and businesses need to implement a multilayered system and embrace different communication methods, including ones they may not originally have considered.

During the San Diego wildfires a few years ago, voice networks quickly went down. Yet, as we saw with the New Orleans CIO, crises often breed creativity. Some of the fire victims realized they could send SMS messages to Twitter, a social networking site, to report the latest conditions in their area. In an emergency, receiving instantaneous information is critical to deploying assets or providing relief from miles away. In this case, a platform that emergency officials may not have realized would hold such value greatly assisted information exchange. Of course, authenticity and trust are also essential.

So, the next phase of preparedness will involve building opt-in and trusted networks to scrape dependable information together and get a true sense of an unfolding event. But this example highlights why the public and private sectors need to tap into platforms that people are naturally using and not erect barriers to the way information is exchanged. The message matters more than the medium.

3. Ensure response systems are mobile.

In a number of recent disasters, the facilities authorities expected to use were simply unavailable. After the September 11, 2001, attacks, the New York City emergency operations center, located in the World Trade Center, immediately went down. In the midst of the crisis, the mayor had to find a place for responders to congregate and then enable electronic communication. This underscores the importance of mobility.

If your multimillion-dollar response center falls victim to the same flood that has put your business knee-deep in water, you should be prepared, for example, to turn a high school gymnasium located on higher ground into your command center. Your data needs to be mobile and available anywhere your command center might be established.

The data is critical in an emergency because it is not enough to connect people if we do not also arm them with the information needed to make critical decisions. Much of the corporate world has embraced web content and benefited from its portability. Now, disaster preparedness should motivate the public sector to become more proactive about establishing a stronger online presence and making information available through web interfaces.

The greatest value you can offer as a government or corporate IT leader is your ability to ask questions that have not been asked before. It is not about solving your problems today, but about projecting and preparing for how you might respond tomorrow.