{"id":1212,"date":"2008-07-19T12:08:44","date_gmt":"2008-07-19T16:08:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/2008\/07\/19\/the-quixotic-quest-for-invulnerability\/"},"modified":"2008-07-19T12:11:30","modified_gmt":"2008-07-19T16:11:30","slug":"the-quixotic-quest-for-invulnerability","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/2008\/07\/19\/the-quixotic-quest-for-invulnerability\/","title":{"rendered":"The Quixotic Quest for Invulnerability"},"content":{"rendered":"

Schneier on Security: Homeland Security Cost-Benefit Analysis<\/a>.<\/p>\n

A very worthwhile read – basically:<\/p>\n

The premises:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. The number of potential terrorist targets is essentially infinite.<\/li>\n
  2. The probability that any individual target will be attacked is essentially zero.<\/li>\n
  3. If one potential target happens to enjoy a degree of protection, the agile terrorist usually can readily move on to another one.<\/li>\n
  4. Most targets are “vulnerable” in that it is not very difficult to damage them, but invulnerable in that they can be rebuilt in fairly short order and at tolerable expense.<\/li>\n
  5. It is essentially impossible to make a very wide variety of potential terrorist targets invulnerable except by completely closing them down.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    The policy implications:<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. Any protective policy should be compared to a “null case”: do nothing, and use the money saved to rebuild and to compensate any victims.<\/li>\n
    2. Abandon any effort to imagine a terrorist target list.<\/li>\n
    3. Consider negative effects of protection measures: not only direct cost, but inconvenience, enhancement of fear, negative economic impacts, reduction of liberties.<\/li>\n
    4. Consider the opportunity costs, the tradeoffs, of protection measures.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/blockquote>\n

      There’s nothing new here – this is all common sense stuff, really. This paper just backs it up with research and evidence. Now, if we could just get our leaders to ACT on it, instead of their current tactic of fear-mongering and ass-covering, we’d all be a lot better off.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      Schneier on Security: Homeland Security Cost-Benefit Analysis. A very worthwhile read – basically: The premises: The number of potential terrorist targets is essentially infinite. The probability that any individual target will be attacked is essentially zero. If one potential target happens to enjoy a degree of protection, the agile terrorist usually can readily move on… Continue reading The Quixotic Quest for Invulnerability<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"webmentions_disabled_pings":false,"webmentions_disabled":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2,17],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-1212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","category-society","tag-security","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pimUj-jy","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1093,"url":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/2008\/04\/30\/camera-terrorist\/","url_meta":{"origin":1212,"position":0},"title":"Camera = Terrorist","author":"Keith Survell","date":"April 30, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"If you have any doubts that we are becoming more and more paranoid, this article should put your doubts to rest. Photographers have had it hard ever since 9\/11 - everywhere they go they're being harassed, having their cameras confiscated, being told they can't take photos here or there (often\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "society"","block_context":{"text":"society","link":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/category\/society\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":570,"url":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/2005\/07\/11\/bad-conclusions\/","url_meta":{"origin":1212,"position":1},"title":"Bad Conclusions","author":"Keith Survell","date":"July 11, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"I worry about the bad conclusions that our government officials are going to be coming to after this attack. It\u2019s so easy to become \u201creactionary\u201d to these sorts of things, and that\u2019s just what you don\u2019t want to do.","rel":"","context":"In "politics"","block_context":{"text":"politics","link":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/category\/politics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3394,"url":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/2011\/04\/07\/risks-benefits-and-costs-of-homeland-security\/","url_meta":{"origin":1212,"position":2},"title":"Risks, Benefits, and Costs of Homeland Security","author":"Keith Survell","date":"April 7, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"We've spent over one TRILLION dollars on \"homeland security,\" but what have we really gotten out of it?","rel":"","context":"In "politics"","block_context":{"text":"politics","link":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/category\/politics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3479,"url":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/2011\/09\/08\/trust-no-one\/","url_meta":{"origin":1212,"position":3},"title":"Trust No One","author":"Keith Survell","date":"September 8, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"In the post 9\/11 America, you are presumed guilty until... well, you're pretty much always presumed guilty.","rel":"","context":"In "politics"","block_context":{"text":"politics","link":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/category\/politics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":899,"url":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/2007\/06\/18\/over-reacting\/","url_meta":{"origin":1212,"position":4},"title":"Over-reacting","author":"Keith Survell","date":"June 18, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Terrorism is a real threat, and one that needs to be addressed by appropriate means. But allowing ourselves to be terrorized by wannabe terrorists and unrealistic plots \u2014 and worse, allowing our essential freedoms to be lost by using them as an excuse \u2014 is wrong.","rel":"","context":"In "politics"","block_context":{"text":"politics","link":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/category\/politics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":125,"url":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/2004\/03\/19\/they-want-to-kill-us-anyway\/","url_meta":{"origin":1212,"position":5},"title":"They Want to Kill Us Anyway","author":"Keith Survell","date":"March 19, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"The point is, we're basically dealing with a new kind of terrorist here, the kind who hates \"us\" (by which I mean everyone who's not a terrorist, which is basically everyone on Earth)","rel":"","context":"In "politics"","block_context":{"text":"politics","link":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/category\/politics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1212"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1212\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.starkeith.net\/coredump\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}