IEEE VAST Challenge 2011 - epidemics, cybersecurity and text mining for counter-terrorism

IEEE VAST Challenge 2011

The VAST Challenge is a participation category of the IEEE VAST 2011 Symposium (part of VisWeek 2011). The VAST 2011 Challenge continues in the footsteps of previous contests with the purpose of pushing the forefront of visual analytics tools using benchmark data sets and establishing a forum to advance visual analytics evaluation methods. It is hopped that it will speed the transfer of VA technology from research labs to commercial products, and increase the availability of evaluation techniques.

Teams may enter one or more mini Challenges independently of the entering the Grand Challenge. ALL teams submitting an entry to a VAST Challenge will be invited to discuss their work during a challenge workshop.

Entries will be judged on both the correctness of the analysis (based on the availability of ground truth) and the utility of the tools in conducting the analysis. Participants have several months to prepare their submissions.

The story & challenges

Vastopolis is a major metropolitan area with a population of approximately two million residents. During the last few days, health professionals at local hospitals have noticed a dramatic increase in reported illnesses. (...)

• MINI CHALLENGE 1: Geospatial and Microblogging - Characterization of an Epidemic Spread. Identify approximately where the outbreak started on the map (ground zero location). If possible, outline the affected area. Explain how you arrived at your conclusion.
• MINI CHALLENGE 2 : Cybersecurity - Situational Awareness in Computer Networks. Using the new situation awareness display(s), what noteworthy events took place for the time period covered in the firewall, IDS and syslog logs? Which events are of concern from a security standpoint?
• MINI CHALLENGE 3: Text Analytics - Investigation into Criminal Activity. Identify any imminent terrorist threats in the Vastopolis metropolitan area. Provide detailed information on the threat or threats (e.g. who, what, where, when, and how) so that officials can conduct counterintelligence activities. Also, provide a list of the evidential documents supporting your answer.
• GRAND CHALLENGE: Combines all data sets.

Via KDNuggets.