Ontology-based Disruption Scenario Generation for Critical Infrastructure

Critical Infrastructures (CIs) are exposed to a wide spectrum of threats which vary in nature and can be either internal or external. THREVI2 project aims at assisting Authorities and Operators to get comprehensive information of all potential disruption scenarios relevant for CIP through creating a comprehensive and multi-dimensional all-hazards catalogue for CI. It consists of two ontologies (CI systems and Hazards & Threats affecting CI) connected through vulnerability and (inter)dependency models. Its final implementation in a software tool (PATHFINDER) is aimed to support analysts in specifying the overall system of systems and generating a set of relevant disruption scenarios. The paper presents the adopted ontology development process and describes the main features of the final integrated set of ontologies. CI ontology covers Energy, Transport, Water and Telecommunications sectors, comprising 11 subsectors in total – each being described through two sub-ontologies (physical and functional) interconnected within the service delivery topology. Hazard & Threat ontology systematically characterises different typologies of events, their attributes, types and possible effects to CI systems. The validation process of the final ontologies is also described. Finally, the progress and challenges in modeling interdependencies is discussed, as well as further developments that will take place.