Essay Sample on Role of Port Facility Security Officer (FSO) in Port Security

Introduction

The Port Facility Security Officer (FSO) is a key individual tasked with the responsibilities of managing the port security functions (Bichou, 2015). Also, the FSO has key responsibilities of planning, implementing, developing as well as maintaining the port. Hence, the port facility security officer is the overall person in charge of the entire security functions at the port (Bichou, 2015). Besides, the FSO has a mandate of ensuring that the overall security measures are well taken care of to protect the port security (Nair et al., 2010). Lastly, the facility security officer is also responsible for applying security procedures to all corridors of the port, increase the security guidelines mainly through security drills, exercises, and identify the vulnerable as well as the weak areas (Nair et al., 2010).

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Several crucial resources are available to the port facility security officer:

Human Resources: this typically refers to the recruited workforce that is associated with the handling of threats. These individuals are highly trained professionals with the ability to deal with behavior-related to terrorism and criminal activities in domestic as well as in international platforms (Nair et al., 2010). The threats assessment depends on the security of the organization, together with the human resource component. Notably, the facility security officer should have a good corporation with local along with state government comprising of law enforcement agencies in order to have access sources as well as authority over intelligence information (Nair et al., 2010).

Information from Intelligence: this is one of the resources that are available to the port facility security officer, especially in fighting criminal activities and terrorism (Shieh et al., 2012). This information from the intelligence may be further be classified as; a) Signal Intelligence- these are the electronic transmission date, which is collected by satellites or planes and ships. From this instance, the facility security officer is capable of conducting adequate research activities and the methodologies of the criminals and terrorists, hence making a proper action plan together with the proactive measures in place to deal with any terrorist attack as well as criminal activities (Shieh et al., 2012). b) Human Intelligence is termed as the information received from the working personnel who are recruited for the sole purpose of ensuring security. c) Open Sources Intelligence- these are essential information gathered from publicly available sources, for instance, newspapers, internet, news reports, and libraries (Shieh et al., 2012).

Surveillance: is also a critical resource that is available to the port facility security officer more so in fighting criminal activities and terrorism (Navamani et al., 2017). Surveillance is typically carried out with the aid of photos as well as images that are obtained by drones and aircraft. These images, together with the photos, will significantly help the FSO's in covering any unforeseen incident before taking place. The FSO has the privilege of observing any unusual activity, thus puts measures in advance to properly deal with it perfectly (Navamani et al., 2017). Besides, after getting any threats, FSO can as well inform the coast guards who will take the correct measures in handling and neutralizing the risks to the security.

The International Ship and Port Facility and Security Code (ISPS): the ISPS code mainly helps in enabling as well as enhancement of port security. However, the code has specific weaknesses; for instance, the inability of IMO to adequately enforce their set rules and regulations (Shieh et al., 2012). The International Ship and Port Facility and Security have a crucial weakness since it does not utilize some vessels that are important to various forms of maritime criminal activities as well as terrorism (Shieh et al., 2012). However, this can comprise of fishing vessels, and vessels that were constructed on or before June the year 2001

Functions of MTSA 2002 Required Area Maritime Security Committee

The Area Maritime Security Committee is an important body that is tasked with the mandate of holding as well as improving the standards of the nation's ports (Bichou, 2015). Moreover, the Area Maritime Security Committee has the key responsibilities of effective planning, unity, communication, coordination, and opens working relationships within the ports (Bichou, 2015). These roles are significant to the port security in ensuring that the ports are effectively protected from criminal activities as well as terrorist acts.

Notably, the Area Maritime Security Committee provides a guideline to private and federal sectors in order to have a consistent as well as open communication amongst them (Bichou, 2015). However, this communication, various forms of information, and working relationships can effectively be utilized in order to evaluate the potential of each and every sector. Hence, this can greatly aid especially in crisis situations since a number of sectors have different supplies, workforce, and information, and these resources can be utilized altogether (Crowell, 2018). Importantly, this procedure works best for information as well, and that vitally aid with the protection as well as securing of ports. Also, the Area Maritime Security Committee has a key responsibility of improving the security at the port through training, provisions of plans, resources, and structured guidelines on how the port should be operated (Crowell, 2018). Lastly, the Area Maritime Security Committees aid in the correction of the imperfection in infrastructure as well as in port facility by improving in major areas within the port (Crowell, 2018).

There are a number of reasons why the Area Maritime Security Committee is critical to the secure operation of a port. For instance:

Cybersecurity: the Area Maritime Security Committee has constantly engaged in a number of cybersecurity-related activities. This organization has formed cybersecurity sub-committees with the aim of helping in addressing the resilience of cyber-related issues, information sharing, and cyber risk (Abdelfattah, 2017). However, the Area Maritime Security Committee is yet to form a specific cyber subcommittee to address cyber-related problems more so in other well-established subcommittees such as law enforcement and Intel (Abdelfattah, 2017). Also, there are several examples of Area Maritime Security Committee cyber activities, the North California Area Maritime Security Committee, as well as Long Island Sound Area Maritime Security Committee, who took an active part in the 2007 Nation Cyber Guard Prelude exercise (Abdelfattah, 2017).

Active Shooter: the Area Maritime Security Committee has addressed a number of ways that can effectively be used to mitigate physical threats more so in the marine environment (Pearl, 2019). The Area Maritime Security Committee small passenger vessel subcommittee played a key role in helping in the collection as well as risk analysis data of an active waterborne shooter in order to develop a proper response protocol thereafter a drafting a Passenger Ferry Threat Plan (Pearl, 2019).

Notably, there are a number of areas, especially within the security regime, where the Area Maritime Security Committee members can actively work more closely (Pearl, 2019). For instance, the Area Maritime Security Committee is allowed to work with the various sectors of the port in the provision of significant insights more so in helping deal with various forms of threats (Pearl, 2019).

Maritime Cyber Terrorism

According to Lagouvardou (2018), maritime cyber terrorism is the measures that explain the extent to which technology property could be in danger/threatened by an event or a circumstance, hence leading to security or safety failures and related shipping operations as a result of system or information being compromised, lost or corrupted.

Examples of Maritime Cyber Terrorism

There are several types of maritime cyber terrorism that normally occur in maritime environments. These threats include hacking of the ship system. Hacking of ships system as a maritime cyber threat comprises of jamming as well as spoofing (Fittone et al., 2015). Moreover, these two forms of ship hacking are the major forms of maritime cyber terrorism, and consequently, they are capable of affecting the route of ships on various destinations massively. A good example is a case whereby a terrorist or a criminal group decides to jam GPS and radio signals, particularly on a ship; through this, the terrorist groups are capable of preventing a ship, particularly from finding its way to a safe destination (Fittone et al., 2015). Through this act, the ships eventually become vulnerable to future attacks.

Also, spamming as an example of maritime cyber terrorism occurs when the ship's onboard navigation system is sending corrupted coordinates (Lagouvardou, 2018). Spamming can be used by terrorist groups in luring ships with the intention of terrorizing the ship and crew altogether. Thus, this action can result in a larger as well as physical terror attack, for instance, the ship being navigated to an area that eventually becomes an ambush (Lagouvardou, 2018).

Hacking and spamming as the main examples of the marine cyber terrorism acts can be used altogether by the group of terrorists with the main aim of creating an ambush that can lead to a ship being taken over or the crew being killed or held captive (Lagouvardou, 2018). Moreover, in case the ship holds useful products or resources in it, they will be stolen as well.

Notably, a number of pirates groups who spam or hijack ships at sea are significantly sponsored by terrorist groups (Egan et al., 2016). The terrorist group's main aim is to cripple the economy of a country by using these pirates to massively gain supplies and ships (Lagouvardou, 2018). Moreover, since cybersecurity and ship technology is normally behind the office security with a maximum of twenty years, this can significantly be a big threat to the port security of operation in the near future.

The best way to tackle maritime cyber terrorism is by maximizing the cybersecurity technologies used on ships. Also, by having radar jammers which are portable will significantly help incoming jam frequencies used by the terrorist groups in crippling radio signals as well as ship navigation (Egan et al., 2016). Also, there is a necessity of training people on cybersecurity and other security measures, which will significantly increase the security of the port now and in the future (Egan et al., 2016). And those who shall have been trained adequately should be capable of helping on the prevention of spoofing with the use of scanners that are capable of detecting radio signals that are used by the terrorist groups in attacking the ships.

Conclusion

In a nutshell, the paper has explicitly discussed four official resources that are majorly used by the port facility security officer in assessing the international as well as domestic security risks. Also, the paper has discussed the roles of MTSA in regard to the Area Maritime Security Committee. Examples of maritime cyber terrorism, such as hacking and spamming, are discussed.

References

Abdelfattah, M. M. (2017). The Role of International and National Legislations in Enhancing the Maritime security of port facilities. BORDER SECURITY AND SAFETY, 195.

Bichou, K. (2015). The ISPS code and the cost of port compliance: an initial logistics and supply chain framework for port security assessment and management. In Port Management (pp. 109-137). Palgrave Macmillan, London.