The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is conducting a Cash for Locating and Identifying Quick Response codes (CLIQR) Quest Challenge, “a prize-based challenge that seeks to advance the understanding of social media and the Internet, and explore the role the Internet and social networking [play] in the timely communication, wide area team-building and urgent mobilization required to solve broad scope, time-critical problems.” The challenge began on Feb. 23rd and runs until 12pm EST on Thursday, March 8th. A cash prize of up to $40,000 will be awarded to the first contest entrant to find and submit all of the QR codes.

According to the challenge website:

In time of crises, we must ensure that the right resources make it to the right area in the right time. Delays in finding those resources cost more than time and money, delays cost lives. Finding the most efficient method of resource identification and delivery is paramount. It is a capability with clear relevance and importance to the military when it is called upon for assistance and existing data sources and social network analysis are not sufficient for accomplishing this task.

 

The CLIQR Quest has been crafted to simulate public mobilization for the identification of essential assets to assist in mobilizing and delivering aid efficiently. The event, like an actual crisis or disaster, is unannounced prior to the start date. The humanitarian crisis relief assets (e.g. water, food, gas, etc.) needed to quickly respond to a disaster are represented by appropriately named — Quick Response (QR) codes. QR codes have been distributed throughout the continental United States to represent the dispersion of resource concentrations throughout the country. CLIQR Quest participants will be challenged to locate other participants who have key assets that are represented by the QR codes. The event will only last for two weeks — the notional assets must be identified and coordinated quickly to ensure they make it to those in need.

This contest seeks to build upon the DARPA Network (“Red Balloon”) Challenge, which established social media as a means for self-organization:

In 2009, the DARPA Network Challenge sought innovative solutions from non-traditional Department of Defense sources to determine the speed and self-organizational potential of social networks. That challenge, in which participants were asked to locate balloons geographically dispersed around the continental United States, was a clear demonstration of the efficacy of crowd-sourcing to solve some of today’s challenges and provided a benchmark for our understanding of how the internet and social media have evolved. Having established the capability to use social media to self-organize in an unstructured, pre-announced challenge, DARPA now seeks to elevate that nascent concept and use it in a revolutionary application.

 

The DoD Domestic Preparedness Support Initiative,in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense and Americas’ Security Affairs, coordinates Department of Defense (DoD) efforts to identify, evaluate, deploy, and transfer technology, items, and equipment to Federal, State, and local first responders.

 

Through the DoD Domestic Preparedness Support Initiative, the DoD fulfills Congress’ intent to support public safety and homeland security by leveraging taxpayer investments in defense technology and equipment. Partnerships with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Department of Justice (DOJ), and communications with first responders, are critical for success in this important mission! Working closely with DHS and DOJ, the DoD Domestic Preparedness Support Initiative promotes the advancement, commercialization, and transition of high priority DoD projects that can result in first responder capability improvements.

 

The DoD Office of Humanitarian Assistance, Disaster Relief, and Mine Action, in the Defense Security Cooperation Agency, provides program management for DoD humanitarian assistance programs funded with the Overseas Humanitarian Disaster and Civic Aid (OHDACA) appropriation across all regional Combatant Commands (COCOMs). This includes steady state humanitarian assistance projects, transportation of DoD and privately donated humanitarian material, humanitarian mine action train-the trainer programs, and foreign disaster relief. HDM works closely with its counterparts in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense (Policy), as well as congressional staffs, to ensure the COCOMs are appropriately resourced, and that they execute in accordance with policy, fiscal, and legal guidelines.

 

In support of the DoD Domestic Preparedness Support Initiative and the Office of Humanitarian Assistance, Disaster Relief, and Mine Action for overseas humanitarian assistance, the CLIQR Quest will increase our understanding of advancements in social network theory, by providing a structured, time-constrained, real-world contingency scenario with the goal of establishing potential protocols for the Department of Defense to effectively engage the public to assist in humanitarian assistance both at home and abroad.

 

In time of crises, we must ensure that the right resources make it to the right area in the right time. Delays in finding those resources cost more than time and money, delays cost lives. Finding the most efficient method of resource identification and delivery is paramount and is a capability with clear relevance and importance to the military when it is called upon for assistance; existing data sources and social network analysis are not sufficient for accomplishing this task.

To learn more, and to enter the challenge, check out the website.

(Contributed by Erwin Gianchandani, CCC Director)