Port Operations Stakeholders: Security and Privacy for Data Exchange

Port operations supply chains are complex as they deal with many stakeholders who have varying objectivesand requirements. Port Authorities are striving to collect sufficient data from the stakeholders to improve (i)operational efficiencies, (ii) strategic decisions on asset use, maintenance, and personnel; and (iii) marketingand business development. Nicom Maritime is searching for a software solution that would enable retrieval ofsufficient data from the port operations stakeholders in order to gain the benefits listed above. The problem isthat the current ICT based solutions, particularly in North America, provide the stakeholders with their owninternal systems that often operate as independent silos and limit data sharing to only support the requiredoperations. Furthermore, the stakeholders are reluctant to disclose detailed information about their operationsfor reasons of security and also because they are worried that their data may be obtained by their competitorswho may gain insight into their operations, which can then be used against them. Thus, any data exchangewith the stakeholders would need to provide not only strong security for data in transit and storage, but alsoprivacy assurances that the data is accessed only by appropriate authorized entities and for appropriate use ofthe data for which it was collected. Another issue is data integration as the stakeholder systems exchange datawith interfaces using different data and protocol standards. Thus, Nicom Maritime and Dalhousie Universityteam in this research project will address the following challenges:1) Information retrieval from stakeholders must be performed using their existing interfaces (so that minimalmodifications of the stakeholder system is needed).2) Information retrieved form a stakeholder will be authorized and audited by the.3) Data transfer is secure and once collected privacy of data accessed must be ensured.4) Issues, arising due to differences in data exchange standards and protocols used by stakeholders, must beresolved.