Critical Infrastructure Working Group

Mission

The purpose for the Critical Infrastructure Protection and Recovery (CIPR) Working Group (WG) is to provide a forum for the application, development and dissemination of systems engineering principles, practices and solutions relating to critical infrastructure protection and recovery against manmade and natural events causing physical infrastructure system disruption for periods of a month or more.

Critical infrastructures provide essential services underpinning modern societies. These infrastructures are networks forming a tightly coupled complex system cutting across multiple domains. They affect one another even if not physically connected. They are vulnerable to manmade and natural events that can cause disruption for extended periods, resulting in societal disruptions and loss of life.

The inability of critical infrastructures to withstand and recover from catastrophic events is a well-documented global issue. This is a complex systems problem needing immediate coordinated attention across traditional domain and governmental boundaries. For example, the US President issued an updated National Security Memorandum on Critical Infrastructure Security and Resiliency in April 2024 that addresses a national unity of effort to strengthen and maintain secure, functioning, and resilient critical infrastructure.  This update expands upon the threats and requires greater collaborative efforts across all executive departments.

This includes an imperative to implement an integration and analysis function to inform planning and operations decisions regarding critical infrastructure. This working group will seek to support this and other policies with international reach. INCOSE, as the premier professional society for systems engineering, can provide significant contributions toward critical infrastructure protection and recovery.

Scope

Certain man-made and natural events have a known potential to affect societies at a national, continental or even global scale. Such events can cause extreme harm well beyond those experienced from regional catastrophic events, especially when the effects will take longer than a month to recover. Three examples of events with the potential to cause critical infrastructure collapse include Solar Storms caused by Coronal Mass Ejections (CME), Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) and Cyber Events (intentional and otherwise). The CIPR WG will pursue its goals by addressing these three classes of events, and other classes of events with similar potential, when identified such as pandemics, massive weather events.  We also seek to collaborate with other INCOSE Working Groups that share similar goals.

The CIPR WG will promote and apply systems engineering principles with emphasis on policy, analysis and concepts useful to understand, protect and recover existing operational infrastructure, and to provide strategies, standards and concepts for more resilient approaches, through evaluation, development and implementation of specific recommendations that can be accomplished with primarily volunteered resources. It will promote and perform activities supporting the stated goals.

This scope is synergistic with other INCOSE WGs identified above (e.g. MBSE, System of Systems, Resilient Systems, Power & Energy, etc.). For example, the application of model-based approaches will be essential to analyze the problem and to communicate alternative conceptual solutions. Therefore, this WG will seek interest and participation from INCOSE members and the other INCOSE WGs. It will also reach out to engage international and governmental organizations, professional groups, critical infrastructure providers, and others stakeholders. MOUs, contracts and other kinds of agreements may be sought with external organizations as needed to further the effort. These agreements, if any, will be established according to INCOSE guidelines, processes and procedures.

The critical infrastructure domains addressed by the CIPR WG include the following sectors. Other domains may be addressed as the need is identified.

1. Chemical
2. Commercial Facilities
3. Communications
4. Critical Manufacturing
5. Dams
6. Defense Industrial Base
7. Emergency Services
8. Energy
9. Financial Services
10. Food and Agriculture
11. Government Facilities
12. Healthcare and Public Health
13. Information Technology
14. Nuclear Reactors, Materials, and Waste
15. Transportation Systems
16. Water and Wastewater

Goals

• To support CIPR WG Members through monthly speakers and other events
• To grow the practice of System Engineering (SE) in the Critical Infrastructure (CI) Domain through the use of Model Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) and other tools