Emerging Technological Risk

Abstract

Society is increasingly reliant on complex computer-based systems ranging from control systems in aircraft, trains and cars to business critical systems such as e-banking systems to systems that are an integral part of our critical national infrastructures. These systems have to be dependable—failures can have serious consequences, e.g. loss of life, loss of essential services or significant financial losses. Despite much progress having been made in technical approaches to achieving dependability—there is still a long way to go—many failures arise through the interactions of organisations, people and computer systems. It is possible to tackle these problems and make significant steps forward in improving dependability through an interdisciplinary approach. This book draws on the Interdisciplinary Research Collaboration in Depend- ability—the DIRC project—a truly multidisciplinary project, bringing together researchers with backgrounds in computer science, mathematics, psychology, sociology and business. It involved researchers with an interest in dependable socio-technical systems from the Universities of Newcastle, York, Lancaster, Edinburgh and City University London. The long-term (six-year) research project supported the development of knowledge, methods and tools that enhance our understanding of socio-technical system dependability and support developers of dependable systems. This made remarkable progress across a number of areas. The interdisciplinary contribution has been increasingly recognised as an important insights into dependability research. Interdisciplinary