Following the severe catastrophes experienced around the world in 2011, organizations now have an opportunity to learn lessons from these events and reduce the adverse impact of future incidents on their balance sheets.

These are the conclusions of a new paper published the other day by Marsh. The paper says that the scale of the catastrophes experienced in 2011 exceeded previous loss-modeling predictions and has challenged established thinking on the nature of risk. The paper says that, post-2011, companies need to re-examine their risk management strategies and introduce new methodologies to strengthen their operational and financial resilience.

Read more @ www.homelandsecuritynewswire.com

From the FEMA Blog by: Tim Manning, Deputy Administrator, Protection and National Preparedness and David Miller, Associate Administrator for Federal Insurance and Mitigation

At FEMA, we’ve been working hard to ensure that our nation continually strengthens its resiliency and becomes as prepared as it can be against all hazards. Today we took another step forward in that ongoing effort with the release of the Comprehensive Preparedness Guide 201: Threat and Hazard Identification and Risk Assessment. The THIRA process builds on the progress we’ve achieved so far with the National Preparedness Goal and the description of the National Preparedness System. Ultimately, the THIRA process provides a common way to more fully understand all of the risks communities face – thus helping the emergency management team make wise decisions to keep people safe.

What makes the THIRA unique is that it doesn’t just look at natural hazards or terrorist threats. Instead it takes into account the threats and hazards that pose the greatest risk to a community—regardless of the cause. The preparedness guide lays out a five-step process on how to do that, and it is adaptable to the needs and resources of our local, tribal, territorial, and state homeland security and emergency management partners.

Read more @ blog.fema.gov

Providing IT security will only get tougher over the next couple of years as digital threats become more numerous and complex.

That’s the gist of a new report from the Information Security Forum entitled Threat Horizon 2014: Managing Risks When Threats Collide.

“While individual threats will continue to pose a risk, there is even more danger when they combine, such as when organized criminals adopt techniques developed by online activists,” Steve Durbin, global vice president of the Information Security Forum, said in announcing the report. “Traditional risk management is insufficiently agile to deal with the potential impacts from activity in cyberspace.”

Read more @ www.govinfosecurity.com

From Kim Stephens @ iDisaster 2.0

How do you create resilient communities?  It’s a tough question. Just yesterday I sent out a tweet about preparedness and the ubiquitous fact sheets that government agencies produce. Does anyone read them? If someone does read them, do they take action, e.g. prepare a  ”go-kit,” or purchase insurance, etc.? Maybe, I mused, images of disasters would help encourage people to prepare. One of my colleagues @Cherylble (Cheryl Bledsoe)  answered “@Kim26stephens, you presume a natural interest in emergency management and I would tender ppl only interested if hazard is imminent #smem”.

An imminent hazard is certainly something that spurs action. Therefore, it would seem that if the public only knew and understood their risks (e.g. the frequency of hurricanes)  then they would take the necessary steps to mitigate those risks. But the research study “Communicating Actionable Risk for Terrorism and Other Hazards” – Michele M.Wood,1,∗ ,† Dennis S. Mileti et. al., published 10 June 2011,  found that it is much more important “… to emphasize the communication of preparedness actions (what to do about risk) rather than the risk itself.” They call this type of activity “communicating actionable risk“.  Another key finding, which is highly relevant in today’s connected world, was that “households in American are most likely to take steps to prepare themselves if they observe the preparations taken by others…”.

Read more

If a management support service has slowly shifted too close to supporting an inherently governmental function, the Government Accountability Office says a fresh pair of eyes can bring the risk into view.

“We found that concerns were generally raised by officials who were new to a program office or contracting officials who had assumed responsibilities for an existing contract,” GAO wrote in a report on the risks associated with support services. The report was released Jan.6.

For instance, a senior official in the Transportation Department’s Airline Information Office raised concerns about a lack of government employee expertise to oversee IT duties. Contractors had developed and also exclusively operated the duties for several years.

Read more @ FCW.com