British Standards Institution BSI publishes guidance to protect against malicious contamination

A new guide is available to help food businesses protect themselves from malicious attacks that could lead to contamination of products.

The Centre for the Protection of National Infrastructure (CPNI) commissioned the British Standards Institution (BSI) to develop a Publicly Available Specification (PAS) on how food and drink businesses can protect, mitigate and minimize the impact of ideologically motivated attack on food supply chains. PAS 96 addresses all forms of malicious contamination, including extortion, prank, fraud and terrorism.

Following consultation with 60+ food organizations (including Defra, Marks and Spencer, Waitrose and the National Farmers Union), PAS 96 – which was first published in 2008 – has now been thoroughly revised and updated.

This revised edition includes a section on the ‘insider threat’ in protecting against malicious contamination. ‘Insiders’ are individuals (employees, contractors, etc) with legitimate access to an organisation’s assets but with unauthorised intent.

The guidance also incorporates a new protective strategy, that is entitled ‘Threat Assessment Critical Control Point’ (TACCP). This is because ‘threats’ require the capability and motivation of the attacker and of weaknesses (vulnerabilities) to be taken into account in the process, rather than consideration of actual incidents.

Publicly Available Specification (PAS) 96, Defending food and drink. Guidance for the deterrence, detection and defeat of ideologically motivated and other forms of malicious attack on food and drink and their supply arrangements is available to download at www.bsigroup.com/pas96 and from CPNI www.cpni.gov.uk.