Shipping Container Vulnerability

On a daily basis, 17,000 shipping containers enter the U.S. from around the globe. According to the Brookings Institution, only about 2% are being inspected by Customs officials.

"A terrorist attack using a container to conceal a so-called dirty bomb...could probably stop global trade in its tracks," said Robert Bonner, U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner. If the U.S. were to inspect all 6 million to 7 million containers per year, the cost would skyrocket. A single inspection can cost up to $5,000, with direct human intervention.

Several technology and shipping companies are working together to find answers to shipping container vulnerability. These include:

-- A shoe-box-sized wireless sensor being developed by IBM and the Maersk shipping line. The Tamper-Resistant Embedded Controller (TREC) is lodged inside a shipping container and provides information on the container's position and condition.

-- Radiation detection devices and intruder systems that detect radiation and track tags on containers.

-- A combination of radiology and neutron inspection in one system. Rapiscan Security Products, Hawthorne, CA, offers a system that provides a 2D transmission picture of the inspected cargo or vehicle.

-- Nuclear Resonance Fluorescence Imaging (NRFI) - "an active interrogation technology that allows the identification and discrimination of practically any material in highly packed and loaded containers of large size," said Robert Ledoux, CEO, Passport Systems. 

(According to Forbes.com)