The holistic security information in a 182 page reference manual is about proactive threat mitigation, vulnerability assessment, and the protection of assets against intentional destruction. Holistic refers to the integration of a wide array of three-dimensional protective layers and systems from the technical aspects of CCTV, fences, locks, and cyber security to the psychological and physical aspects of surviving a terrorist attack. A critical key to protecting America’s infrastructure, government facilities, businesses, and population is to educate oneself and others — that is, to gather public domain intelligence about the threat. The document’s purpose is to understand the genesis of the problem and to recognize security weaknesses in order to make informed decisions related to asset protection and the safety of the public.

What is the magnitude of the threat? Should the United States be worried when only five percent of the cargo that enters its ports is inspected, or when security at nuclear power plants is dismally inadequate? Possessing quality information is a definite attribute that can mean the difference between success and failure — and now is the time to proactively arm oneself with relevant and accurate information, or at least the sources of such information. Simply, this is the ancient Chinese philosophy of knowing your enemy and yourself. If you know both, you will generally succeed; if you know neither, you will never succeed, and if you know only one of the two, you will only sometimes succeed.

Information must be gathered about proactive and reactive security methods, procedures, planning, firewalls and responses at all levels and depths. The security of the individual infrastructure, facility or business must be assessed and the technology for “holistically” protecting it must be tailored to the results of the assessment. For many large infrastructures, this has already been done (some mandated by federal law), or is at least an ongoing effort. However, for many of the smaller infrastructures, the security problem has not been seriously nor completely addressed. Furthermore, the planning and preparedness against terrorist activity for manufacturing and businesses are woefully lacking. About 85 percent of all privately-owned infrastructures and facilities have inadequate security and are easily vulnerable to attack. Most do not consider themselves targets and are not willing to spend the money to implement and install the necessary safeguards. Their rationale (i.e., safety in numbers) is that statistically, in a probabilistic sense, they are not a target.

Global terrorism has a long history and it is not expected to go away tomorrow. The United States ill-planned invasion and seemingly endless occupation of Iraq (based on faulty WMD and terrorist intelligence) has undoubtedly precipitated the growth of a new generation of anti-American terrorists around the world. Although security is being tightened on many fronts and new counter-measures are being implemented, upgraded, and installed, simple but ingenious attacks, such as the 1993 and 2001 World Trade Center (Twin Towers) attacks against Americans and American property are undoubtedly in the planning stages now. These future attacks will be much less frequent than the non-terrorist sabotage attacks seen at industrial sites (primarily disgruntled employee problems) but they will be much more devastating. If an amateur geek 15-year-old boy in Canada with minimal, if any, hacking expertise can paralyze the Internet and bring billion-dollar businesses to their knees from his bedroom computer, imagine what a sophisticated internet attack by skilled terrorists can accomplish. If an employer does not believe that background checks should be part of the hiring process and unknowingly hires someone with a criminal history, this may spell future trouble related to sabotage or terrorism. A newly-hired terrorist may engage in fraud, identity theft or hacking of computers and confidential information. The result could either fund terrorist activity or allow vulnerabilities to facilitate an attack. The potential is there and it can happen. Thus, this list of references is intended to reside on the desk of every facility manager, government official at any level, business executive, public utility commissioner, security professional, and threat assessor and any other person who has direct or indirect responsibility to protect assets.

The reference manual is available in print or as a download.

William C. Butler, PhD
Butler Research, LLC
Evergreen, CO 80439

Everyone lies. It is not abnormal behavior until it becomes compulsive, excessive, and chronic interfering with the individual’s ability to cope with life. These compulsive liars are becoming detached from reality and have a major character flaw. About 60 percent of “normal” people tell one lie every ten minutes during a typical conversation. Everyone to some degree deceives by concealing, omitting, distorting, embellishing, exaggerating, or falsifying information or the truth. The amount of dishonesty displayed in our verbal communications is all relative – some people just tell “little lies” and some people tell “big lies” that later have major consequences. It is not easy or even possible to be truthful 100 percent of the time. All people lie with good intentions – it fulfills a basic need. Tartaglia (1999) suggests that the subtle intention of lying is to be in control. He also states that all children lie to test their parents in order to see how much they can get away with.

Lying is fundamental in the human condition and a crucial dimension of all human relationship (Smith, 2004). It follows that everyone is constantly bombarded by new and possibly inaccurate information from various media and through interpersonal relationships. Conversely, everyone practices detecting the deception they know exits in the world. This plethora of information is therefore automatically, even unconsciously, evaluated for truthfulness. But how do we know what information is accurate and what is not? Among adults, there are vast differences in deceptive abilities – a skill learned early in life (Lewis and Saarni, 1993). We rely on intuition — which may not always be right — and non-verbal communication to help in this process of determining truth. More specifically, a fundamental skill for investigators and interviewers operating in a world awash in deception, misinformation, and disinformation is the ability to know something about an interviewee’s mindset, such as, the veracity of what they might be thinking, and if they are showing defensive, neutral or aggressive signs.

To know when someone is “cognitively challenged”, anxious, and under emotional stress because they are lying, particularly when they are adamant about their truthfulness, has obvious advantages. It is important to note however that just because a person is under emotional stress does not mean that the stress is due to lying. Probably two-thirds (70 percent per Inbau, et. al., 2005) of all human communication takes place through subconsciously displayed (involuntary) body language. According to Wainwright (2003), “Body language is nearly always a better guide to the truth than even the most eloquent words”. Mehrabian (1971) concluded that only 7 percent of our information-gathering comes from the actual language used in conversation – the rest comes from body lingo and voice patterns, volume, cadence and pitch. Therefore, being able to spot these non-verbal warning signals, indicators, or gestures of deception plays a paramount role in the quality of decisions investigators and security professionals make daily. The problem with detecting lies is that most people are poor lie detectors (lie catchers); studies have shown that unless one is very highly trained in this area, there is only a slightly better than a 50-50 chance of detecting lies by intuition. About a fourth of one percent of the population can consistently detect lies (The Associated Press, 2004). Even judges and law enforcement officers are not much better than the general population at detecting lies (Ekman, 2001).

This focus of this article is neither interviewing techniques nor the formulating of interview questions nor the use of polygraph techniques (Moenssens, et. al., 1995; Ekman, 2001). These are topics expertly covered in Inbau et. al. (1986 and 2001); rather, it is a description of the common clusters of non-verbal body signals that individuals subconsciously use when they “talk with their body”. This is a brief introduction to the analysis of body language for the purpose of recognizing clues, signals, gestures, and posturing as they relate to the true emotional state and mindset of an individual, and ultimately to the true meaning of their verbal messages. Most people normally use a variety of gestures, such as hands and facial expressions (illustrators), when they speak to assist the listener. [more...]

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