Critical Infrastructure Protection in The Netherlands: A Quick-scan

Abstract

Some sectors and parts of the Dutch national infrastructure are that essential to the Netherlands that serious disruption or even loss of service could lead to a severe impact to the Dutch society, government and industry as well as to neighbouring countries. Early 2002, the Dutch government started the critical infrastructure protection project 'Bescherming Vitale Infrastructuur' with the objective: 'The development of an integrated set of measures to protect the infrastructure of government and industry (including lnformation and Communication Technology)'. This paper describes the first steps of this project: a quick-scan determination of what vital products and services the nations' critical infrastructure is comprised of, the (inter)dependencies of fhese products and services, and underlying essential processes. The paper outlines the project context and execution, and describes the methodologies, results, and lessons learned.