Ed Flynn remembers the days when he could drive unencumbered near an industrial site, or ease through the security checkpoint at the airport. That all changed in the days, weeks and months after 9/11, as the nation’s security landscape was irrevocably altered.
The Louisiana Chemical Association began receiving calls from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the U.S. Secret Service, U.S. Marshals and a host of other law enforcement agencies as they all became acutely aware of vulnerabilities in the nation’s infrastructure.
Until then, site security wasn’t even on LCA’s radar.
These days, as 10/12 Industry Report details in a new feature, there’s never a lack of things for LCA’s security committee to talk about, as there has been a proliferation of threats that couldn’t have been imagined 19 years ago.
The regulation of drone technology is a popular current topic—whether by air, land or water—followed closely by cybersecurity, corporate espionage and terrorism.
“We continue to see malicious, unauthorized activity in regard to drones,” Flynn says. “From a chemical industry perspective, we’re also concerned about unmanned land-based vehicles and submersibles. You have a lot of sophisticated and vulnerable technologies on the docks and piers of these plants.”
LCA says there have been recent incidents when unauthorized drone flights have been detected near industrial sites along the Mississippi River. “We’ve seen indicators and evidence of foreign governments using drones equipped with high-resolution video cameras and other types of photographic evidence at night,” he adds.
In addition to drones, cybersecurity threats surfaced in August when Gov. John Bel Edwards declared the state’s first cybersecurity emergency in the wake of a ransomware attack on state government servers.
Industry’s biggest security challenge is simply staying one step ahead of technology. Read the full story in the latest edition of 10/12 Industry Report.
