A Service Oriented Approach (SOA) to the IT-based Protection of Critical Infrastructures--A First Approach to Integrate SOA into a Complex Operational Analysis within Risk Assessment and Risk Management Processes

摘要

The design and optimization of comfortable decision support systems becomes more and more important. One disadvantage of many complex systems is that they often consist of a large amount of heterogeneous single applications that are inefficiently integrated into the overall process. This happens as such processes tend to grow over time, caused by an increase of complexity and supplementary demands by users for further functionalities, which leads to demands of new applications that are added to the system and need not always be compatible to the legacy applications. This results in process inefficiencies such as breakings in the media chain, high coordination effort, redundancy and an inefficient handling of information as the processing time increases. In case of threat on a critical infrastructure element, a fast and flexible acquisition, processing, and allocation of information are crucial. Flexibility, fast adaptability, and high process efficiency are central characteristics of a Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) which qualifies it to be used in the context of OR analysis in order to protect optimally the critical infrastructure. This contribution gives an introduction in SOA as well as an overview of an integration of SOA-elements within the analysis of complex critical infrastructures. We combine an approach from an operational point of view together within a service-orientated framework within such a complex decision support process of an OR/MS-analyst.