The fusion of organic and non-organic identity information sources using evidential reasoning. Discussion. Author's reply

The aim of this paper is to explore the problem of identity data fusion in the context of naval warfare where commanders and their staff require access to a wide range of information to carry out their duties. With the increasing use of the remote sources and the increasing use of information that has already been fused, there is a requirement to define an identity data fusion function that can handle organic and non-organic, local and remote types of information characterized by different accuracy and timeliness. This paper is a step towards the definition of an architecture that can perform the fusion of organic and non-organic identity data through the use of statistical analysis rooted in the Dempster-Shafer theory of evidence. The goal is to offer the decision maker a quantitative analysis based on statistical methodology that can enhance his/her decision making process regarding the identity of detected objects.