A Web-Based Collaborative Portal for Sharing Safeguards Knowledge

The CSSP has been assisting the IAEA in the application of collaborative tools to facilitate groups working together. These tools include web-based technology such as wikis and blogs. Comparisons of open-source and proprietary collaborative tools and the options for potential use of these tools at the IAEA have been discussed in papers the authors presented at previous INMM annual general meetings – Collaborative Software Tools for Safeguards Applications (2007) and Using Wikis as a Low-Cost Knowledge Sharing Tool (2005). Some potential users are concerned that collaborative software would introduce a security risk and are reluctant to deploy such tools, particularly where they are accessed by corporate “road warriors” in remote locations. This paper examines these concerns and provides practical suggestions for securing the tools to provide a portal for sharing information and knowledge in a secure environment. SharePoint is a proprietary tool that provides an attractive option for security-conscious organizations such as the IAEA because its security features integrate well into an information technology infrastructure based on Windows clients. This paper explores SharePoint blogs and the possibilities for using third-party tools in a SharePoint environment. Rather than suggesting a choice of proprietary versus open-source tools, the authors describe how to “mix and match” proprietary and open-source tools to provide cost-effective solutions for knowledge workers. The suggestions and conclusions in this paper would be of value to organizations with similar mandates and security concerns.