August 2010
Features
By Consuelo Bangs
While airports worldwide struggle to maintain security and regulate access to restricted areas, some facilities have found a solution by implementing the most advanced and accurate identification technology available: biometrics.
By Fredrik Nilsson
Mal-intended people operate under the cover of night, knowing that darkness makes it hard for them to be detected and identified. While it is difficult for humans to see in darkness, our eyes compensate by opening the iris. But a wide-open iris is easily blinded by sudden, direct illumination. Video cameras work in a similar way.
By Kim Rahfaldt
Since 1925, northern New Jersey has turned to Holy Name Medical Center in Teaneck for healthcare excellence. While its patient volume and service delivery have recently undergone extensive expansion, Holy Name Medical Center employed an outdated and difficult-to-maintain security system that had outlived its usefulness. Holy Name’s newly built Emergency Care Center and status as a Medical Coordination Center for disaster preparedness helped drive the funding needed to invest in a new security management system. Hospital officials chose AMAG Technology’s Symmetry Security Management System with Symmetry Video. This offered Holy Name access control, video and alarm monitoring on one platform.
By Ralph C. Jensen
The workplace is supposed to be a safe place. A hospital, especially, is meant to be a place of health and healing for patients and a safe place to work for staff. Rush University Medical Center in Chicago is like many other medical facilities, where the mission is to provide the best care possible. Hospital officials also know that security is a key component to the hospital’s mission and the safety and security of its employees.
By Bradford Beale
Shortly after 6 p.m. on Sept. 28, 2009, two gunmen entered Avi Pawn and Jewelry in the Minneapolis suburb of Richfield. After stealing a small sum of money, one of the criminals fired a single shot that grazed the store clerk and fatally wounded a customer. The local news usually supplements these stories with grainy, off-center pictures of the crime captured from store surveillance cameras. But when local television stations broke the news that evening, the images were startlingly clear. It took less than two days for the public to identify the men involved in the murder. After viewing footage from other local surveillance cameras, the police identified the getaway car and took a third accomplice into custody.
By Jennifer Toscano, Jon Mooney
The typical access control system in use today, in all too many cases, is installed in stages. As a result, it is comprised of different brands and disparate products, many of which do not integrate into the same system or talk with each other.
By Lee Garver
Losing control is never a good thing, especially when it comes to a building’s key system. Unfortunately, this is exactly what happens when facilities are lax in their key control policies and wait too long to re-establish order.
Departments
By Terry Neely
Technology alone does not drive true innovation. Choosing the right technology, then properly adapting and utilizing it, gets you on the path to true innovation.
By Megan Weadock
In recent years, biometric security systems have moved beyond the more tradition applications -- such as access control at businesses, government facilities and ports -- and into some surprising realms.
By Sherleen Mahoney
The southern border typically receives more media attention and employs stricter security measures than the northern border. However, the United States and Canada share more than 5,000 miles of border, while the United States and Mexico share 1,900 miles. The Canadian border is a prime throughway for people and drugs.