VAST challenge 2014: The Kronos incident

The 2014 IEEE Visual Analytics Science and Technology (VAST) Challenge presented researchers with a single fictitious scenario: the disappearance of staff members of the GASTech oil and gas company on location on the island of Kronos. A group named the Protectors of Kronos (POK) was the prime suspect in the disappearance. Three mini-challenges and a grand challenge were offered. Mini-challenge 1 included multiple types of text data for participants to provide a timeline of key events and characterize the POK, mini-challenge 2 focused on individuals´ movement and financial data for participants to provide patterns of daily life, and mini-challenge 3 featured real-time streaming social media and emergency service data for participants to provide hostage and kidnapper information. The grand challenge asked the participants to integrate results and generate a synopsis of events. The VAST Challenge received 73 submissions from 13 countries.