Category: Conferences

Euro-Atlantic Stakeholder Conference 2009: Highlights

From the Euro-Atlantic Stakeholder Conference EASC2009 presents a few highlights from the conference in Stockholm, Sweden, earlier this month. The following text is copied from the email sent out to the conference participants.

HIGHLIGHT KEYNOTES & PRESENTATIONS
There were many memorable keynotes and presentations. In one of the most compelling, physician and epidemiologist, Dr. D. A. Henderson described the international effort he headed during the 1960s to eradicate smallpox, for which he received the Medal of Freedom in 2002.
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Mr. Sten Tolgfors, Swedish Minister for Defence (also responsible for Homeland Security) joined MSB Director General Helena Lindberg for a great overview and insight into Sweden’s practical and functional approach to maritime multi-force interoperability.
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U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security, The Honorable Janet Napolitano welcomed the audience with a special video, introduced by Mr. Brad Buswell, Under Secretary (acting) for Science and Technology, DHS.
Mr. Buswell also welcomed the webcast audience of international registrants(in no particular order) from the United Kingdom, Canada, Jamaica, Ireland, Germany, Finland, France, Spain, Italy, Greece, Turkey, Ukraine, Slovenia, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Switzerland, France, Lithuania, Spain, the USA and even Singapore, Australia, China, Japan and Taiwan.
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Dr. Starnes Walker, Director of Research, DHS Science & Technology Directorate, moderated a session with a number of the Directorates Division Directors including the Chem/Bio, Explosives, Human Factors, Infrastructure & Geophysical, Borders & Maritime, and Command Control & Interoperability divisions.
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Talking at EASC09

On October the 2nd, I will give a talk on Societal Security 2.0 at the Euro-Atlantic Stakeholder Conference in Stockholm, organized by MSB and DHS.

Title: Societal Security 2.0 : Using mobile consumer terminals and Social Media applications on secure and robust mobile broadband networks on a mass scale.

Abstract: Crisis response and society security will in the coming years face completely new challenges. The old military-like solutions based on a hierarchical command and control structure will be obsolete due to its inflexibility and high costs.

We tend to design for yesterdays problem and we often lack the capacity to look deep into the future. In order to reach Societal Security 2.0, we as researchers, designer, technology providers and policy makers must make a radical shift in our current thinking. Instead of centralized super-stationary command centers with over-whelming computing capacity, we must aim for super mobile organizational structures with distributed capacity on a massive scale.

The future for situation awareness is not found in proprietary technology and data fusion centers but in consumer electronics, commercial networks and the power of the many in a crowd-sourcing approach. Sweden must make a dramatic shift for society security and crisis response that fully embraces mobile consumer technology, the next generation social media applications and robust commercial mobile broadband networks. The future is all about providing mobile capabilities into the hands of local and regional organizations on a massive scale. Information will be produced and consumed using the mobile terminals we always have ready-at-hand in any situation we will face.

Euro-Atlantic Stakeholder Conference in Stockholm, Sweden on 1-2 October 2009

http://www.easc09.se/ Organized by MSB.

ISCRAM2009 has started and here some initial reflections made

ISCRAM2009 has now started and the keynote presentation from Mr Lars Hedström from the Crisis Coordination Secretariat gave an inspiring talk that resulted in interesting Q&A in the end of his presentation. Apparently there are three different issues that Lars would like to see further development:1) Crisis preparedness as part of everyday work ie. being able to quickly react to a sudden event. 2) Persistent monitoring i.e having the capabilities to set up technology and procedures to monitor a specific event or individual objects of that event.3) Strategic assessment i.e continuously early detection and analysis for weak signals on foreseen and unforeseen events based on a scenario-based approach Based on Lars talk, the following issues crossed my mind. Early detection seems to be a challenging area that very well could be applied not only to natural-objects of a disaster such as a earth-quake, infectious deceases or physical threats. My point is that such early detection could also be very valuable for social objects. Would it be possible to monitor the social interactions between various actors of the crisis response system and as early as possible detect that the current mobilization of actors deviate according to plan or other key requirements of the specific situation.

Just a few days away: ISCRAM 2009

World Conference in Disaster Management: June 21-24, 2009

ISCRAM2009 i en stad nära dig.

Info och Anmälan: www.iscram.org


ISCRAM2009:
6th International Conference on Information Systems for Crisis Response and
Management May 10-13 2009 Göteborg, Sweden

With more than 30 DAYS left until the paper submission deadline, we would like to inform that the submission system is now open. This also means that there is plenty of time in order to finalize your valuable and exciting contribution. We are all looking forward to see you at ISCRAM 2009 in Gothenburg Sweden.

PAPER SUBMISSION DEADLINE: Sunday January 11, 2009
Submission types: Academic Research Papers and Practitioner Presentations.

GENERAL TRACKS AND SPECIAL SESSIONS
Papers for ISCRAM2009 cover all aspects of information systems for crisis response and management, broadly defined but still related to the 10 general tracks, and may take the form of completed research papers, research-in-progress papers as well as practitioner presentations.
* Humanitarian Actions and Operations

* Collaboration and Social Networking

* Human-Computer Interaction

* Geo-Information Support

* Intelligent Systems

* Standardization and Ontologies

* Research methods

* Technologies, Tools and Demos

* Open-track

In addition to the above general tracks, there is also 18 special sessions covering specific aspects of this domain. Please have a look at at the ISCRAM Community website (http://www.iscram.org) for detailed information of the tracks and special sessions CFPs.

SPECIAL EVENTS AND ACTIVITIES
During the ISCRAM 2009 conference there will be a selection of special events such as a PhD-colloquium, Workshops, Hands-on Demo Sessions, Poster Sessions and a practitioners side-event. Additional information about these events will be made available at http://www.iscram.org

PAPER SUBMISSION DEADLINE: Sunday January 11, 2009
Please also join the ISCRAM Facebook group

Conference Co-Chairs ISCRAM2009
Jonas Landgren
Bartel Van de Walle

En konferens för bland annat Svensk Krishantering


Den internationella konferensen ISCRAM: Information Systems for Crisis Response and Management, arrangeras 10-13 maj 2009 i Göteborg. Konferensen som arrangerats sedan 2004 besöks av forskare och yrkesverksamma som arbetar med olika delar av krishanteringsområdet. Konferensen i maj 2009 beräknas ha c:a 250 deltagare från en mängd olika länder.

Konferensen organiseras av Viktoriainstitutet och IT-universitetet i Göteborg i samarbete med bland annat Lindköpings Universitet, FOI samt Lindholmen Science Park.

En av målsättningarna med denna den sjätte upplagan av konferensen är att attrahera personer från svensk krishantering både som deltagare på konferensen, men också som presentatörer. Temat för konferensen är “gränsöverskridande initiativ och nya perspektiv”, vilket signalerar att konferensen verkligen vill skapa möten mellan forskare och yrkesverksamma för att diskutera frågeställningar och byta erfarenheter kring design och användning av IT och informationssystem för olika typer av krishantering.

Konferensen är ett perfekt tillfälle för kommunal räddningstjänst, länsstyrelse och andra myndigheter att öka sina kunskaper kring forskningsfronten samt själva bidra till utvecklingen inom området.

Konferensen är öppen både för akademiska forskningsbidrag och bidrag från yrkesverksamma. De akademiska bidragen kommer att genomgå sedvanlig granskning (Peer-review). Bidragen från yrkesverksamma skall omfatta 1 A4-sida text samt tillhörande presentationsbilder och bedöms enligt andra kriterier än de akademiska bidragen.

Konferensen kommer att hållas på Handelshögskolan i Göteborg, 10-13 maj. För mer information besök www.iscram.org eller kontakta: jonas.landgren@viktoria.se

ISCRAM 2009: Call For Papers


Today, we are happy to have the ISCRAM 2009 Call for Papers available.
Please go to www.iscram.org for detailed information.
Nine different tracks and over fifteen special sessions are available. Submissions can be made both on a general track level as well as to specific special sessions. PAPER SUBMISSION DEADLINE: Sunday January 11, 2009

ISCRAM2009 : 6th International Conference on Information Systems for Crisis Response and Management. May 10-13 2009. Göteborg, Sweden

ISCRAM 2009 Program Chair
Jonas Landgren

Träffpunkt Krihs

Förra veckan deltog jag på Träffpunkt Krihs som är en årlig konferens som anordnas av en forskningsgruppering på Mitthögskolan i Östersund. Årets konferens inleddes av Havidán Rodríguez från det mycket erkända Disaster Research Center i Delaware, USA. På konferensen fanns jag själv med som talare och mitt föredrag handlade om Social Mjukvara och Krishantering. Den kanske provocerande titeln var Social Software – När vaknar Svensk Krishantering. Mitt föredrag var dock inte en kritik mot svensk krishantering utan syftade istället till att motivera och inspirera svensk krishantering att börja fundera kring vilken roll som social mjukvara har, bör ha samt kan komma att få. I efterföljande gruppdiskussioner kommer många goda synpunkter fram som pekar på att social mjukvara är en intressant kategori mjukvara men att det är allt annat än teknikaspekter som bör beaktas när en organisation bestämmer sig för att börja använda sådan teknik. Träffpunkt Krihs var ett mycket proffsigt arrangemang där Anna Olofsson, Elin Montelius, Erna Danielsson för att bara nämna några, gjort ett mycket bra arbete med att få så många från svensk krishantering att medverka. Att Krihs-gruppen på Mitthögskolan dessutom gör spännande och viktig forskning gör ju inte saken sämre.

The Fire Service College (UK) Conference in November 12-13 2008

Have a look at this Research Event that has been organized annually since at least 2003 at the Fire Service College in Moreton-in-Marsh, UK. Dr Anne Eyre is heading the RE08 Conference Team and when I attended the conference in 2003 it was a great opportunity to discuss my research.