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Unsustainable logging and illegal logging for domestic and international trade and trafficking continue to lead to deforestation. It is crucial that Sustainable Development Goal 15 ‘Sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, halt and reverse land degradation, halt biodiversity loss’ is achieved to maintain the livelihoods of people and protect the planet. This is the case in Vietnam as well, where many people, including indigenous groups, rely on the forest for their survival. Drawing on semistructured interviews in Vietnam and a literature review, we investigate how the abuse of forest policies leads to human insecurity. From this, we propose solutions to (1) end unsustainable harvesting and illegal logging (SDG 15.7), (2) integrate the value of forests (culturally and economically) into national and local planning, the development process and poverty elimination strategies (SDG 15.9) and (3) improve the use of forest protection funding provided by international donors.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the possible benefits arising from the application of the human security concept to analysing the disaster impacts.

A three-piece human security analytical tool is synthesized by combining the discoveries in human security studies over the last two decades with the perspective of disaster studies focusing on the resilience and securitabilities of the affected societies. To illustrate the merit of the proposed analytical framework a specifically tailored social survey is used to measure the resilience of Ogre’s (Latvia) society after it faces major floods in 2013. It foresees that community’s resilience is inversely proportional to the decreases along seven human security dimensions while directly proportional to the trust to different security providers.

The illustrative case study proves a larger deterioration of security and a wider scope of “socially affected” victims than could be identified with the field observations or document analysis. It also proves that the people in crisis situations clearly trust to themselves, friends and family, while much less to the conventional security providers or the local municipality or government. While the security is to be perceived more multi-faceted than homogenous, the results prove that the environmental and food security concerns due to the hazard climbed the fear rankings replacing the usually feared health security.

The paper provides several counterarguments to the critics of Human Security concept by proving its comprehensive application to any society despite its level of development, while also offering a new analytical approach to measure the security and resilience of people facing a sudden dangerous external impact, such as a natural hazard.

Human security is far more than the absence of conflict. It encompasses education and health, democracy and human rights, protection against environmental degradation and the proliferation of deadly weapons. It may be referred to as the concept of “freedom from want and fear”, which includes economic, food, health, environmental, political, community and personal security. Human insecurity, whether generated by neo‐liberal globalization, militarization, trafficking and the sex industry, social inequality, poverty, terrorism and local conflicts, is a big challenge at the beginning of the twenty‐first century, as much for developing countries as for the countries of the Atlantic Community. The interrelated challenges of human security and peace require an integrated multilateral response of the international system, a consistent human security policy that focuses on the responsibility of each and everyone. In short, it is a call for the globalization of responsibility for human security.

The purpose of this paper is to look into how people in risky environments define human security by using the framework of the draft human security index of the Third World Studies Center, University of the Philippines to study five municipalities. The concept of human security used here is the comprehensive definition that covers “freedom from fear” and “freedom from want” dimensions but using a more local/bottom-up perspective in getting people’s sense of security and threats/risks. As a pilot research, the paper also reveals the shortcomings of the draft index as it does not highlight yet other factors like gender, ethnicity and other sectoral identities.

The pilot municipalities all have a history of violent conflicts or insurgency and they also face other security threats/risks, e.g., natural disasters and effects of climate change, limited sources of livelihood, lack of food, water shortage, etc. Through surveys, focus group discussions and interviews, people were asked about their sense of security and experiences, perceived threats to individuals and the community, understanding of human security and their capacity, as individuals and as a community, to cope with and/or do something about these threats. The focus of the manuscript, however, is the more qualitative responses of informants.

In these conflict areas, poverty and the limited livelihood opportunities are major threats, followed by threats to food, environmental, personal and community security (particularly peace and order). The perceived intensity of certain threats also varies depending on the type of community or group one belongs to. It appears that respondents have a comprehensive view of human security; what they lack are resources and skills to mitigate such threats. Community empowerment and improved local governance are crucial with support from external actors.

It is important to look at the experiences of other areas without histories of armed conflicts to understand possibly different security issues and threats/risks and include perspectives of people based on gender, ethnicity and other identities.

The research shows the value of using local/bottom-up perceptions of people apart from available development and security statistics (which are usually top-down, very general and universalistic) to assess, monitor actual and plan future interventions to address human security threats and vulnerabilities at different levels. The qualitative and quantitative data from the ground are also useful in refining human security-related concepts, hypotheses and theories.

This paper aims to provide an understanding of the proportions of incidents that relate to human error. The information security field experiences a continuous stream of information security incidents and breaches, which are publicised by the media, public bodies and regulators. Despite the need for information security practices being recognised and in existence for some time, the underlying general information security affecting tasks and causes of these incidents and breaches are not consistently understood, particularly with regard to human error.

This paper analyses recent published incidents and breaches to establish the proportions of human error and where possible subsequently uses the HEART (human error assessment and reduction technique) human reliability analysis technique, which is established within the safety field.

This analysis provides an understanding of the proportions of incidents and breaches that relate to human error, as well as the common types of tasks that result in these incidents and breaches through adoption of methods applied within the safety field.

This research provides original contribution to knowledge through the analysis of recent public sector information security incidents and breaches to understand the proportions that relate to human error.

Iraqi society has suffered from loss or fragility of human security since 2003. The developmental policies, programs and plans of the successive Iraqi Governments throughout the transitional period have not been able to achieve human security, despite the availability of different resources. They have also not prevented or limited the spread of corruption, according to domestic and international reports. Now the country faces a large phenomenon of corruption and the dilemma of human security loss. This study aims to ascertain the nature of the relationship between the phenomenon of corruption and the dilemma of loss or fragility of human security in Iraq since 2003 to learn about the form of this relationship, how the selected variables contribute to the two phenomena and determine the degree of impact of corruption and its dimensions on human security and its components.

This research uses the social survey methodology of the sample taken from the Iraqi society and benefits from system analysis approach to identify the inputs and outputs of the variables researched. Moreover, the study uses the case study methodology to collect data and information precisely in an in-depth manner to support qualitative and quantitative analysis and clarifies the situation at the macro level of both phenomena.

Findings show the prevalence of corruption structurally in the Iraqi state and society. The contribution of dimensions and selected indicators in the spread of corruption and lack of human security varies. Findings also underline a strong statistical correlation between the two variables and their reverse relationship. In other words, the more the corruption is, the less the opportunities of human security are. There is also a strong impact of corruption and its dimensions on the conditions of human security factors.

The paper provides profitable findings and recommendations, which can be used by the Iraqi relevant institutions to eliminate corruption, achieve human security and benefit from its indicators in research and development.

The new addition of this research can be represented by linking the two phenomena and trying to build national standards with the capacity to describe, interpret and predict.

Posits an effort has been made to discuss transitions from traditional security to human (or comprehensive security) in South Asia. Concludes that some light has been thrown on the United Nation’s (UN’s) role in security‐shift phenomenon, as the UN also needs some reform.

Railways are a well-known example of complex critical infrastructure, incorporating socio-technical systems with humans such as drivers, signallers, maintainers and passengers at the core. The technological evolution including interconnectedness and new ways of interaction lead to new security and safety risks that can be realised, both in terms of human error, and malicious and non-malicious behaviour. This study aims to identify the human factors (HF) and cyber-security risks relating to the role of signallers on the railways and explores strategies for the improvement of “Digital Resilience” – for the concept of a resilient railway.

Overall, 26 interviews were conducted with 21 participants from industry and academia.

The results showed that due to increased automation, both cyber-related threats and human error can impact signallers’ day-to-day operations – directly or indirectly (e.g. workload and safety-critical communications) – which could disrupt the railway services and potentially lead to safety-related catastrophic consequences. This study identifies cyber-related problems, including external threats; engineers not considering the human element in designs when specifying security controls; lack of security awareness among the rail industry; training gaps; organisational issues; and many unknown “unknowns”.

The authors discuss socio-technical principles through a hexagonal socio-technical framework and training needs analysis to mitigate against cyber-security issues and identify the predictive training needs of the signallers. This is supported by a systematic approach which considers both, safety and security factors, rather than waiting to learn from a cyber-attack retrospectively.