IP 677: Seminar: Threat Assessment
Faculty, 4 credits
This seminar will introduce students to the theory, tools and techniques of Threat Assessment (TA) through both formal instruction and practical group exercises. The seminar will provide a theoretical background to threat assessment and situate TA within the larger field of risk management, as well as describe its uses and its limitations in various contexts. A selection of specific threat assessment tools will be presented and practical projects distributed to groups of students in order to practice the use of these tools. The course will include much of the same material as the Spring Workshop in Threat Assessment, but will cover additional tools and involve the use of all tools in greater detail. Examples of TA techniques that may be covered are general political/military security analysis; attack trees; indicator-based profiling; and contributing factor diagrams. Tools will be demonstrated through application to a variety of scenarios, including assessment of a country's WMD capability, evaluating a facility's vulnerability to attack and terrorist profiling. No specific mathematical knowledge beyond high-school level is needed, although those students with a more quantitative background will have the option of using more advanced mathematical techniques.