Global Maritime Situational Awareness (GMSA) is defined in th
U.S. National Concept of Operations for Maritime Domain Awareness, December 2007 as "the comprehensive fusion of data from every agency and by every nation to improve knowledge of the maritime domain." It is an integral element of
Maritime Domain Awareness (MDA).
Essentially, no one country, department, or agency holds all of the authorities and capabilities to have effective Maritime Domain Awareness on its own. However, by combining separate pieces of information from agencies at the federal, state, local, and tribal level around the world with information from the maritime industry and other non-governmental organizations, it is possible to keep track of the status of every ocean-bound and sea-bound vessel. GMSA results from combining intelligence given by other regions of the world into a complete picture for identifying trends and detecting anomalies.
Development of GMSA in the U.S.
In the United States, the director for GMSA is responsible for managing data critical to building the situational awareness component of global MDA. The director also develops and recommends policy guidance for coordinated collection, fusion, analysis, and dissemination of GMSA information and products, as well as information integration policies, protocols and standards. The director also recommends improvements to situational
awareness-related activities supporting maritime information collection, fusion, analysis and
dissemination. The director co-chairs the U.S. National MDA Stakeholder Board, sits on the MDA Stakeholder Board Executive Steering Committee, and is a member of the U.S. Maritime Security Policy Coordinating Committee (MSPCC).
The GMSA staff consists of and is supported by dedicated subject matter experts from across the federal government as selected by the Director from departmental nominees from the
Department of Homeland Security
The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is the U.S. federal executive department responsible for public security, roughly comparable to the interior or home ministries of other countries. Its stated missions involve anti-ter ...
,
Department of Defense Department of Defence or Department of Defense may refer to:
Current departments of defence
* Department of Defence (Australia)
* Department of National Defence (Canada)
* Department of Defence (Ireland)
* Department of National Defense (Philippi ...
,
Director of National Intelligence
The director of national intelligence (DNI) is a senior, cabinet-level United States government official, required by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 to serve as executive head of the United States Intelligence Comm ...
,
Department of Justice,
Department of Transportation,
Department of Commerce
The United States Department of Commerce is an executive department of the U.S. federal government concerned with creating the conditions for economic growth and opportunity. Among its tasks are gathering economic and demographic data for bus ...
,
Department of State
The United States Department of State (DOS), or State Department, is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy and relations. Equivalent to the ministry of foreign affairs of other ...
,
Department of the Treasury, and
Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration
The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) is a United States federal agency responsible for safeguarding national security through the military application of nuclear science. NNSA maintains and enhances the safety, security, and e ...
.
The GMSA Director and staff form the
Office of Global Maritime Situational Awareness.
Maritime anomaly detection
Maritime anomaly detection is an area of scientific study aimed at avoiding maritime collisions. There are a number of aspects to this work, and there have been several conferences and workshops exploring the domain. A google search on "Maritime anomaly detection" returns a large number of hits from a wide range of domains. Some of the related topics are:
*Maritime anomaly detection and situation awareness
*Maritime anomaly detection and
threat assessment
Threat assessment is the practice of determining the credibility and seriousness of a potential threat, as well as the probability that the threat will become a reality. Threat assessment is separate to the more established practice of violence-ri ...
*Visual analytics for maritime anomaly detection
Some of the significant events exploring the area are:
*The International Workshop on Maritime Anomaly Detection - MAD 2011
The International Workshop on Maritime Anomaly Detection
(MAD 2011), Tilburg, The Netherlands
See also
* Maritime domain awareness
Maritime domain awareness (MDA) is defined by the International Maritime Organization as the effective understanding of anything associated with the maritime domain that could impact the security, safety, economy, or environment.
MDA is said to ...
References
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Maritime Security Policy (NSPD-41/HSPD-13)
National Strategy for Maritime Security
National Plan to Achieve Maritime Domain Awareness
National Concept of Operations for Maritime Domain Awareness, December 2007
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