The SiND

Learn more about the Security in Numbers Database (SiND), which documents threats and administrative measures that affect humanitarian access or interfere with key services, such as health or education and that affect the work of any not-for-profit organisation.

Data structure

The Security in Numbers Database (SiND) is an event-based database that uses the general principles of event recording (Tilly 2002). The coding system is inspired by the approach of the Taback-Coupland model of analysing armed violence, which is built around the six Ws (Who did What to Whom, Where, When and with what Weapon). This method turns the elements that make up a violent event into independent and structured data points.

All events are coded with their date, location, and perpetrator along with information on the affected aid provider and victim attributes, where relevant. Aid providers are classified by category (e.g., United Nations agency or non-governmental organisation) and the aid sector they serve, such as health, education, food security, or protection. It covers violence as well as reported fraud or cyber crime.

The SiND records the effects of each event. These include effects on:

– a person (usually a staff member of a key aid service provider, such as an aid worker, health worker, or educator) and what happened (kidnapping, death, threat, crime etc.);

– the aid infrastructure (such as project sites, offices, warehouses, hospitals, or schools) and what happened (vandalism, looting, targeted attacks etc.);

– aid access constraints (recorded in the form of a range of external events, such as riots, demonstrations, or active conflict).

The SiND also records the effects on aid delivery (such as closure, suspension or delays in programmes), as far as known.

SiND data sources

The SiND collates data from three primary sources: publicly-available sources (called open sources), relevant events from other databases, and confidential contributions from aid agency partners.

Insecurity Insight uses a custom-built algorithm to identify relevant events as reported in the global media. In addition, Insecurity Insight’s team scans local online and social media resources for relevant stories.

Insecurity Insight regularly reviews event data included in databases such as the Aid Worker Security Database (AWSD), Surveillance System of Attacks on Healthcare (SSA), the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED) and the Global Terrorism Database (GTD). Events in these databases that fulfil the SIND inclusion criteria are checked against the existing information in the SiND.

Data from aid agency partners are confidential to protect their operations in insecure areas. In some instances, Insecurity Insight publishes relevant events in aggregate or non-identifiable form.

Data Process

Identified events are published with source links in the Bi-Weekly Aid in Danger News Brief, and Attacks on Health Care News Brief, and the monthly Education in Danger, Protection in Danger and Sexual Violence in Conflict News Briefs. Individual reports are not independently verified. The News Briefs are shared via Insecurity Insight’s various mailing lists. In some cases, subscribers provide feedback whenever they are aware of some inaccuracies in the reporting.


Key data from the database is made available through these public sites:

– Insecurity Insight’s website on aid workers killed, arrest and kidnapped (KKA), and the data from the Monthly News Briefs on health and education;

– Insecurity Insight’s pages on HDX;

– The global map on violence and threats of violence against health care;

– The story map on violence against health care during the COVID-19 pandemic;

– The country pages.

Partnerships

Insecurity Insight supports the data collection and data analysis for:

– the Safeguarding Health in Conflict Coalition (SHCC);

– the Global Coalition to Protect Education from Attack (GCPEA);

– the Researching the Impact of Attacks on Healthcare (RIAH) project.

If you would like to contribute to the project, please contact info@insecurityinsight.org