Will homeland security products ever be interoperable?

Keenly aware of users' frustration, technologists and government agency officials last week called for greater standardization among the myriad products designed for dealing with terrorist strikes, tsunamai, and other disasters.

NEW YORK CITY (BetaNews) - The list of products geared to protecting people from terrorist attacks and killer hurricanes keeps on growing, from nuclear bomb-sensing technology to underwater surveillance systems and airport runway cameras that can "see in the dark," to give just a few examples.

"The numbers of products coming from the vendors is getting almost out-of-hand," affirmed Paul Singer, vice president of business development for a consultancy called Securewest International, interviewed by BetaNews at the show last week's Maritime Security Conference at New York City's Javits Center.

But although vendors highlighted a lot of these individual offerings, talk was also in the air among technologists and government regulators alike about how to bring diverse products together so they'll work better together in providing extensive yet cohesive systems for public safety.

"There certainly are a lot of different kinds of products here at this week's conference," Singer added. To demonstrate that fact, Singer served as a presenter on a panel which encompassed speakers from General Dynamics and a several smaller technology specialists in various segments of the homeland defense and emergency management markets, such as ObjectVideo, a maker of video surveillance software; Corestreet, a producer of credentialing software; Kongsberg Mesotech, Ltd., an expert in underwater surveillance; and VeriTainer.

Joseph Alioto, VeriTainer's vice president of sales, told audience members at the Javits that VeriTainer -- a company formed just after the 9/11 disaster -- has since created the first crane-based system for detecting nuclear bombs in cargo that has actually been provden to operate successfully.

VeriTainer beta tested the radioactivity-aware crane system in the second half of 1995 2005 as part of the Oakland Pilot Project at the port of Oakland in California.

More recently, in October of this year, a start-up called Sonardyne, another exhibitor specializing in underwater surveillance, tested its sonar-based underwater Sentinel Diver Detection System at the US Naval Underwater Warfare Center in Newport, Rhode Island.

Strolling the aisles of the Javits, Manhattan's largest convention facility, you'd also come across products designed for verification of mobile users, power supply within rugged outdoor environments, mapping of marine environments, overall incident response management, and an almost endless gamut of other purposes related to physical and information security in times of crisis.

But on the other hand, attendees ranging from systems integrators to US federal gencies pointed to current efforts to impose standardization on behalf of government and other enterprise customers, either to promote high standards of product quality, spur easier interoperability, or with both objectives in mind.

Ben Barlin, Senior Engineer, Port Security Solutions for SPAWAR Systems Center in San Diego, said that in his work for the US Coast Guard, he and his colleagues at military software solutions consultancy Serco are using Web services to create systems in which products from multiple vendors -- and even older specialized or "custom" applications previously developed by the Coast Guard -- can "talk" to each other more easily.

Barlin cited examples of Web services standards the Coast Guard is embracing including XML, and Univeral Description, Discovery and Integration (UDDI), a standard aimed at helping various registered users of a Web services-based technology environment get services from the system such as software applications or identification (ID) verification (also known as authentication).

Still, the Web services environment now under way from Serco is flexible enough to allow various users within the Coast Guard to attach their choice of user interfaces for "command and control" purposes, according to Barlin.

Meanwhile, the US General Accounting Office (GAO) is also trying to encourage standardization, said Katherine Siggerud, the GAO's director of physical infrastructure, during another conference session.

Also to help streamline product use and interoperability, the GAO favors a federal emergency response technology framework which encompasses products for both homeland security and management of physical disasters, said Siggerud.

As Singer also pointed out, however, some vendors are having a hard time keeping up with all of the emerging regulations and policies being put forth by the US government around technology requirements.

"We find this to be especially true in the area of cargo security," Singer told BetaNews.