Convenience is not worth the price of a life: Security failures at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde.

Convenience and SecurityBy David Strickland, Vice President of Kenton Brothers

At the meeting point between commercial security and convenience, a decision must be made. Is the convenience worth the price of a life? This all too real scenario was laid out on July 17, 2022 in the pages of the Investigative Committee Report on the Robb Elementary Shooting.

As I write this blog, I’m heartbroken to receive the news that more life has been tragically lost due to poor execution of physical security procedures. As a father of school aged kids, and an industry advocate, I find myself concerned by what I read in the report. It has spawned new conversations with local school districts and how they are managing the risk of active shooters.

Systemic Failures and Poor Decision Making

The Texas state police released their report on the Uvalde School shooting and at the heart of it is “systemic failures and egregious poor decision making.” The report included a scathing rebuke of a culture of complacency. This coupled with a tragically flawed response led to the “loss of 21 souls stolen from their families and friends.”

At 11:33 an armed suspect walked into Robb elementary through an unlocked door. The door was unlocked for the convenience of staff members.

Convenience and Security

Convenience and Security

 

In 2019 Uvalde adopted a policy for responding to an active shooter emergency.

Part of this policy includes:

LOCKED CLASSROOM DOOR POLICY – Teachers are instructed to keep their classroom doors closed and locked at all times. Barriers are not to be used. Substitutes shall follow the same policy, with campuses ensuring they have access to the classrooms they need throughout the day. The Standard Response Protocol procedures are on the back of all of our badges issued to substitute teachers.

STAFF TRAINING – All staff members are trained annually in emergency protocols for the campus. Key campus personnel are CPI-trained.

STUDENT TRAINING & DRILLS – Students receive training on the Standard Response Protocol for lockout, lockdown, evacuate, shelter, and hold. In addition, drills are held for each of these emergency actions on a regular basis

While building security systems including Access Control, IP Video Surveillance, Intrusion detection and Weapons Detection are crucial to physical security, they are only effective if the human element of discipline and accountability to process and procedure are adhered to.

Practice, practice, practice.

Daily habits, that become routine when practiced regularly, dramatically improve the effectiveness of the security systems at any physical site. When these same habits are sacrificed for convenience, it renders your systems ineffective and risk goes through the roof. I can place a $5,000 lock at every door, but If I prop the door open because I don’t like carrying my credential with me, or I don’t like walking around the building to get back in, I have exposed every single soul in that building to a potentially tragic scenario.

I can tell myself that it’s only this one time – but it only takes one time. We don’t get to choose when or where an active shooter will bring violence to our doorstep. We can only control how we prepare and manage the risk of it happening.

The report points out that the door the shooter came in was either unlocked or propped open for the convenience of the staff to leave and reenter the building. “This practice became the norm at the school as there was no accountability from leadership around following security procedures.”

Convenience and SecuritySome will say that hindsight is 20/20.

The report goes on to point out that the school staff were trained in active shooter drills and did have a physical security plan in place, but didn’t follow it properly.

This tragedy should act as a wake-up call and an invitation to evaluate the current organizational management of your physical security systems and practices. Physical security systems, practices and procedures are designed to prevent, delay and reduce loss of life and gain precious seconds and minutes for authorities or designated personnel to respond with overwhelming force.

When was the last time you reviewed your organization’s emergency plan?

When was the last time you had drills to practice the response?

In part 2 of this series on Convenience vs. Security, we will discuss the top 5 ways to help your organization be secure and ready for emergencies.

Evolv Technology – New Weapons Detection Tech Protects Schools, Businesses and Sporting Events

Evolv TechnologyBy David Strickland, Vice President of Kenton Brothers

Innovation is a Kenton Brothers Systems for Security core value. As a 125 year old company, we’ve had to innovate to stay relevant to the needs of our market over the decades of serving our customers. To that end, we are constantly engaged with security industry manufacturers to stay on top of new technologies and how they can impact our mission of Protecting People Property and Possessions.

Evolv Technology

Evolv Technology is a new and innovative weapons detection platform that detects weapons without the long lines you would normally associate with traditional metal detection. If you’ve spent a long time waiting to get into a school or sporting event while the metal detectors do their job, you may be familiar with the frustration that many people feel. We all want a safe experience, and we’re all willing to go through the screening process. However, we’ve all thought to ourselves, “There has to be a better way!” Evolv has created it.

Evolv TechnologyAs the nation debates ways to keep our schools safe, Evolv is creating solutions that give us viable options today. Several school systems across the country have placed Evolv systems in their schools to help promote safe learning environments.

Evolv combines Artificial intelligence with digital sensors to accurately screen visitors, students and staff 10 times faster than traditional methods. Evolv Technology provides touchless security screening that delivers safety without sacrificing the visitor /student experience. Evolv can distinguish between every day items that a person carries and weapons. The system allows car keys, cell phones and spare change to pass through, while alerting on the knives, guns and other threat objects when they are detected.

If a person is carrying a weapon, the sytem will give you an alert to a tablet that a staff member monitors. This alert identifies the person that needs to be screened further and the location of the weapon on that person. This person can enter secondary screening while allowing the flow of students or visitors into the building or venue.

Benefits in a School Setting

  • Eliminate lines of students waiting to pass through security screening
  • Allow students to keep back packs on
  • Enable students to get to class on time without security disruptions
  • Reduce secondary security check alarms from around 40% to less than 10%
  • Easy staff training process – less than one day
  • Create secure environment for learning

Evolv Technology Evolv Technology

A Smart System with Powerful Analytics

The Evolv system also gives you actionable data and ongoing learning that you can use to make adjustments to your policies and procedures.  It’s a smart system that has powerful analytics on board.  The cameras on the system can add focus and attention alarms as well as facial recognition to alert if banned or troublesome persons are trying to gain access to the building or venue.

Evolv TechnologyWith the workforce crunch we are all facing, one huge benfit of this system is the reduction in manpower over traditional systems.  Many venues and school have seen a reduction of over 50% in staffing requirements.

When you combine these factors, you quickly see how the innovation that Evolv brings to the marketplace will quickly have a big impact.

Case Studies

If you would like to discuss how Kenton Brothers can help you innovate your weapons detection process or explore the decision to start a process please give us a call today. We offer these services free to our community.

A Tornado is Coming! Mass Notification Systems from Alertus.

AlertusBy Courtney Emra, Lead Customer Service/Sales Assistant at Kenton Brothers

Unfortunate events in recent history like the Sandy Hook and Virginia Tech shootings, Joplin Missouri Tornado, and numerous disgruntled employee and customer threats have increased the need to communicate with your staff quickly, regardless of their location. We call this “mass notification.”

Mass Notification

Present-day mass notification is different than past notification solutions, which involved dedicated locations or software that would receive an alert message. Today, mass notification systems typically include overhead speakers or paging systems to tell everyone within earshot what is happening and a lot more.

One such mass notification system is Alertus.

Alertus

The Alertus System is configurable for any situation.

Alertus can accept alerts from devices installed in multiple locations around your building, including emergency push buttons, distress buttons under desks, hotkey commands on desk phones, fire or access control systems, NOAA weather alerts, etc. Once an alert is received, Alertus sends the specified alert to mobile or desktop applications, beacons with bright strobe lights and clear tone sounders, overhead paging or phone systems, and large outdoor speakers.

We recently installed a system for a financial company that works with consumers. They knew they could face situations like an active shooter, disgruntled employee or customer, severe weather, or a medical emergency. Each of these scenarios requires unique protocols, but regardless of their requirements, the correct information must be sent to the right people without causing unnecessary panic or confusion.

AlertusScenario 1: Active Shooter or Disgruntled Person

If an employee encounters a threat, they can activate the Alertus System through various devices. They include wall-mounted and wireless activation buttons, an under-desk mounted duress button, and a hotkey combination for any VoIP system.

Once activated, the Alert Beacons display a custom message and exert a sound to get people’s attention. Their overhead paging systems announce the notification through text-to-speech technology, and every computer displays a full-screen message. The system also alerts each user enrolled in their mobile Recipient Application.

AlertusScenario 2: Tornado

The system connects to NOAA weather alerts via the internet and filters the warnings by keywords, such as “tornado and observed.” Once a critical alert is received, the beacons activate a specific message and a different sound tone than Scenario 1.

A full-screen alert containing a custom text notification overrides targeted computers, and recipients can click an acknowledgment button to close the message and provide acknowledgment to safety officials. Similar to Scenario 1, users enrolled in the mobile Recipient Application are alerted.

AlertusScenario 3: Medical Alert

The gym and maintenance shed have activation buttons to enable the System in a medical emergency. The people who need to know about the medical emergency are limited, so we don’t need to send alerts to every beacon, mobile device, etc. Instead, we can send a targeted alert to the beacon that resides with the activation button to notify occupants of the emergency.

We then activate a targeted message on the computers telling the responders where the medical event is. By notifying the people who need to know and informing them exactly where the emergency is, we limit the confusion and panic of the situation while still resolving the issue quickly.

The Alertus System is highly configurable and can be customized to fit your needs. Alertus has several integrations and numerous options for each. To learn more about mass notification systems for your business or campus, call us.

Skyrise Master Key Projects – Hundreds of Locks and Thousands of Keys

By Ryan Kaullen, Field Services Manager at Kenton Brothers

Skyrise Master Key ProjectKenton Brothers is celebrating its 125th year of being a commercial locksmith located in Kansas City, MO. Over the years, we’ve rekeyed just about everything. One of the types of projects we really enjoy is bringing large scale buildings onto master key systems. We’ve talked about Master Key Systems previously. They provide a more secure method of key control.

Recently, Kenton Brothers rekeyed two large skyrise buildings.

Each building was over 15 floors tall, had historical sections, tenant spaces, resident loft spaces, company only spaces and general use spaces. The trick in these kinds of projects is creating a master key schedule that works for everyone involved. There are two dynamics involved… controlling access for the various use cases, and coordinating the physical project of rekeying at this scale.

Both buildings being rekeyed were built in 1939 and have been restored throughout the years to their current conditions. This type of rekey is especially fun for Kenton Brothers because we love being a part of the story of the historic buildings in Kansas City, Missouri that have been around as long (or close to as long) as our company. (We’re proud to have served the community here in Kansas City as commercial locksmiths for as long as we have!) We love working in old buildings like this because of the architecture and design of the buildings. We don’t get to work in those every day and they are beautiful.

Skyrise Master Key Project Skyrise Master Key Project Skyrise Master Key Project

There are a ton of coordination factors to contend with for these types of rekeying projects.

No matter the size of a rekeying project, we first need to create the master key system design and get it approved. Then, we have to schedule installation steps in a way that has the least impact on both commercial tenants and residents of the buildings. (They needed to be given sufficient time to prepare for the rekey.) And the historic sections in both buildings required extra time and planning as well. The most challenging parts of this project was coordination with tenants and having to be extremely careful with the historic doors in both buildings.

We physically had to remove hundreds of locks at each building and rekey them onsite. And we had to cut and stamp over 1,000 keys at each building!

Our main goal with projects like these is to improve the security for people who live and work in these buildings every single day. A master key system helps provide a great first layer of security. We provided quotes for both of these rekeying projects and finished them on time and on budget for our customer.

If your building is past due to be rekeyed, especially if it doesn’t have a master key system in place currently, let’s talk and we will help you secure your people, property, and possessions!

 

Three Security Trends for 2022 – Blurring of Cyber and Physical Security

By Gina Stuelke, CEO of Kenton Brothers

The lines are blurring between cyber and physical security. Here are three important trends we are seeing in the commercial security space for 2022.

1) Organizations will invest in new commercial access control systems and video analytics solutions that are more integrated.

CyPhy Part 1During the pandemic, many businesses had to get creative in managing new health and safety mandates. Controlling social distancing was critical. To adhere to health mandates, retailers, corporate offices, and others needed to know how many people were in their facilities at any given point. This has generated huge demand for occupancy management solutions.

While most are using this technology to count people entering and exiting a building, organizations will continue expanding this technology across all areas of their facilities.

These spatial analytics are helping businesses unlock insights about how people use their facilities. Long after the pandemic is over, they can extract data to learn:

  • How many people are waiting in the lobby
  • How many people are in the cafeteria
  • How specific spaces are being used over time

This data then becomes the catalyst for building improvements that enhance the visitor, employee, or tenant experience.

Implementing video analytics within camera systems can further strengthen site security and delivers more insights. From people counting and directional flow to object left behind and crossline detection, analytics are giving security teams a clearer picture of what’s happening in their environments. Analytics also allowed remote teams to stay on top of threats while securing near-empty facilities during the pandemic. Beyond safety objectives, organizations are using analytics data to reduce wait times, optimize staff scheduling and enhance business operations.

Corporate offices are also finding ways to best optimize their workplaces as they give employees the flexibility to split up their work time between the office and home. This space utilization intelligence helps them better track employee office attendance, monitor meeting room demands and make more informed floor plan changes such as adding more desk-sharing options.

All of this leads to higher operational efficiencies, effective resource management and cost savings.

2) Cybercrime will continue to grow and inspire new strategies.

CyPhy Part 2In today’s world, while we can harden and tighten the physical security of a facility, a truly secure IT perimeter no longer exists. Physical security professionals are collaborating with cyber security teams to put measures in place to deter hackers and protect their businesses.  Choosing trusted vendors and deploying physical security solutions that come with layers of cyber defenses are critical. It’s a layered and collaborative approach.

A report by Cybersecurity Ventures predicts that global crime costs will reach $10.5 trillion annually by 2025. With a growth rate of 15% per year, this is said to represent the greatest transfer of economic wealth in history.

As we continue to see more devices come online (at the rate of 17 per hour) and data processing becomes central to operations, businesses will need to remain agile and responsive to the evolving threat landscape. Businesses will also need to offer greater transparency to meet customer expectations of keeping their data private and secure. All of this will bring in a new model for physical and cybersecurity that relies on continuous verification rather than just hardening networks and systems.

3) More organizations will make the move to the Cloud and embrace a hybrid model.

CyPhy Part 3The pandemic is largely responsible for the surging demand for the Cloud. As online usage and remote work spiked, there’s been a global shift to accelerate digital transformation.

According to a report titled Predictions 2021 by Forrester, global public cloud infrastructure was predicted to grow 35% to a market value of $120 billion in 2021. To thrive in the long run, physical security professionals will need to determine how to best leverage cloud technology and offerings in the years ahead. More chief security officers will let go of the division between cloud and on-premises physical security systems and embrace a hybrid deployment model. This allows them to implement specific systems or applications in the cloud while keeping existing on-premises systems.

This hybrid approach can also be the simplest answer when deciding how to enhance scalability, redundancy, and availability to meet changing needs. Beyond that, cloud offerings provide tons of added value. Physical security teams can quickly migrate to newer technologies, minimize hardware footprint, boost cybersecurity and reduce costs.

It’s an exciting time in the security industry!

Innovation and continuous improvement are happening every day in the commercial security industry, both core values of KB! Let us be your commercial security partner and we will help you navigate these changes!