The critical infrastructure assets that belong to a nation can be both physical items as well as pieces of information. These resources could reside across one or more of a host of sectors ranging from energy to homeland security and technology. Breaches or theft that occurs to these assets through different forms of terrorism or weather conditions are likely to compromise a country’s competitive position, privacy, or safety. Critical infrastructure plans could address sensitive matters broadly or address specific responses that are relevant to the primary segment in which the assets or data belong. Individual states or cities might have their own response plans and a country is likely to develop a broad blueprint.
Before any essential buildings or information can be protected, there generally should be some identification of these landmarks. Critical infrastructure plans might begin with the recognition of which locations are worthy of being included in a strategy. The successful implementation of this process might require the involvement of both public and private market participants depending on the owners of important buildings and data.
Critical infrastructure plans might involve zoning and the determination which regions belong under the protection of certain agencies. In the event that a large, government response does not include certain locations, the proper guidelines might become the responsibility of local groups. Given that there may be a vast amount of items that are eligible to be include in critical infrastructure plans, there may be a division between assets based on the priority that each element commands.
Other types of critical infrastructure plans could address different facets of the emergency response process. Certain measures may be more proactive than reactive to potential terror acts that can occur. For instance, a city, state, or country might designate certain funds to particular infrastructure targets that might be deemed highly valuable. Precautions might be outlined to better safeguard these locations so that assets become less vulnerable to attack.
In addition to protecting a region from acts of terror, critical infrastructure plans may address the event of some weather catastrophe. For instance, there may be residences or entire cities that are at risk of massive destruction from major events such as a tornado, hurricane, or flood. A plan may involve the identification of infrastructure that is especially vulnerable to seasonal weather patterns and derive safeguards that can sustain and protect against the extreme factors that generally accompany intense storms.