Why Integrated Solutions Produce Better Results

In the security industry, the word “integration” gets thrown around far too easily.  Manufacturers constantly talk about “integration.” Customers long for it. How often are they really getting it? 

Recently, we worked with a customer to create a truly unique solution and provide the best level of integration possible between products and vendor partners. Here is a brief overview of the client’s story.    

A juvenile detention center, with 84 beds, was looking to find a cost-effective solution to register, identify and track juveniles while in the facility, as well as, identify and register all visitors and guest of the center. Starting with basic visitor enrollment and identification, BadgePass Visitor Manager was introduced requiring all visitors and guests to present a valid Photo ID, such as a Driver’s License, which then is scanned for their information in order to issue them a temporary ID card to be worn for the duration of their visit. Visitor Manager also allows for easy and accurate electronic reporting on all visitor access into various facilities.

Next, BadgePass Identity Manager was introduced for the identification part of the solution. This offered a quick and easy way to capture photos and document information about each new juvenile being enrolled into the system and even print each one a wristband. By using both Identity Manager and Visitor Manager, the customer received a fully integrated system that allowed for seamless enrollment of both juveniles and visitors into the exact same system. Their new enrollment process also helped to cut down on errors in the record logs, booking and processing time and helped meet state regulations.

For the last piece of the puzzle, we were able to partner with Elliott Mobile Solutions and implement a tracking program. Once each juvenile was issued a wristband, their movement throughout the facility needed to be accurately recorded. EPICTrack served as the perfect solution because it allowed for seamless database integration with the BadgePass system. 

Overall, the customer was very pleased with how simple the registration process of juveniles and visitors had become, as well as the simple tracking process that produced such detailed reporting. Best of all, the integration between all three systems is unmatched.

Something to think about: how different could this outcome have been without fully integrated solutions?    

Lindsay Cornell is the Director of Sales for BadgePass, Inc. BadgePass manufactures cutting edge Door Access, Photo ID, and Visitor Tracking software. Visit www.badgepass.com for more information.

Credential Overflow

Thousands of organizations struggle with a common door access security issue known as Credential Overflow. 

Credential Overflow occurs when the number of active credentials in the system outnumber, sometimes drastically, the number of active cardholders.  If a company's door access system is not equipped to handle the causes of this issue, they may face some serious security risks as a result. 

What causes Credential Overflow?  There are two primary causes: 

1. Lack of Database Communication

Often times, a company's active user database, such as their employee or HR database does not communicate with their access control system seamlessly.  If those two databases do not share information, then the process for activating and deactivating users and credentials usually involves two steps. 

Step One:  Enroll/Remove them from HR
Step Two: Enroll/Remove them from Access Control System

This is not very effective, as any time the second step is missed, cards remain active in the system long after the user has left. 

2. Badge Re-Issuance

Many times cardholders lose badges and ask for reprints, forgetting to have their old cards deactivated at that time.  If the system doesn't support automatic deactivation of old credentials as soon as a new one is printed, the old badge can stay active in the system forever, creating an imbalance in the number of active cards and cardholders. 

How do we fix it?

1. If the access control database can "sync" up with the customer's existing cardholder database, like Active Directory or HR, then this allows for more of a single-step activation and deactivation process.  Once a person has been enrolled or removed from the HR database, they will no longer have active access priviliges in the access control system either.  This is far easier for all parties involved - and much more secure. 

2. Look for door access systems that automatically deactivate old badges as soon as a new badge is printed.  This will help to eliminate the issue with users having numerous credentials associated with their record in the system. 


Lindsay Cornell is the Director of Sales for BadgePass, Inc. BadgePass manufactures cutting edge Door Access, Photo ID, and Visitor Tracking software. Visit www.badgepass.com for more information.

Granting Visitors Temporary Access to Your Facility

What Should My Policy Be?

Many organizations are beginning to electronically register and track visitors that come and go from the facility.  In order to do this, visitors are typically asked to present some type of ID upon arrival, thereby verifying they are who they say they are, and that ID is scanned upon check-in.  Then visitors can then be issued temporary visitor badges for the duration of their stay. 

Organizations typically handle the flow of visitors in their facility one of two ways:

1.       Guests are always escorted by an employee or host.

2.       Guests are allowed to access the facility without an escort.

The more secure the organization, the more concerned they typically are with guest access.  If guests and visitors are to be allowed access without an escort, they may require some level of integration with a door access system.  If this is the case, visitor badges may be printed on proximity or smartcards to grant visitors temporary access rights within the system. 

Why might you consider integrating your visitor management system with access control?

• You want to give certain visitors access to particular doors in the building that may be locked in your door access system
• To limit unauthorized guests and personnel from accessing restricted areas
• In order to track the activity of everyone – even guests – who have entered the building.

Granting visitors temporary access rights is certainly not uncommon these days.  As more and more organizations incorporate access control and electronic visitor management systems in their facilities, they see the need to give visitors access to specific doors in the building for the duration of their visit. 

Things to consider when thinking about integrating your Visitor Management and Access Control systems:

1.       Which doors would you like visitors to have access to in the building?

2.       Would you like to create multiple visitor groups with different access privileges? (Ex: Contractors may be able to access different doors than Volunteers)

3.       Is there an easy way to deactivate visitor credentials if they accidently leave without returning their badge?

The easiest thing to do is implement a fully integrated Visitor Management and Access Control system from day one.  That way you can easily activate and deactivate visitor credentials from the same system, thereby eliminating the hassle of having to manage access rights from two seperate systems. 

Start thinking about how you’d like to implement both Visitor Management and Access Control within your facility in the future.  Taking every possible scenario into account when choosing which system to deploy at your organization will help you to be best prepared for the day when you do get ready to move forward. 

Lindsay Cornell is the Director of Sales for BadgePass, Inc.  BadgePass manufactures cutting edge ID Badging, Visitor Management and Access Control software solutions.  Learn more at www.badgepass.com.

Is Your Current Two-Step Enrollment Process a Security Risk?

In recent news, it was announced that a 19 year old used his old ID badge from a program he took part in at AOL to gain access to the facility for two months after the program had ended!  He lived in the building day and night, using his old access credential to gain access to different areas on the campus.  It was nearly two months before a security guard caught him and kicked him out. 

Stories like this beg the question, "How could something like this have happened?" 

The reality is, this happens every single day!  We just don't always hear about it because these stories don't always take place at high profile locations like AOL Headquarters and don't usually involve two-month-long squatters.  But not deactivating security privileges in Card Access Control systems is a serious threat to an organization's security, and it gets overlooked all the time! 

Think about your own access control system.  How do you add and remove people from the system?  If you are like most customers that I talk to on a regular basis, you probably print your ID badges in one location and then employees are asked to take those new credentials to a seperate location, like Security, to have their access control privileges activated in that system.  It is typically a two-step process. 

The same thing happens when a person leaves the company.  The first database they are removed from is HR or Payroll.  (You and I both know that person isn't getting a paycheck anymore!)  Then, someone in HR sends an email to a person in security, notifying them to deactivate that person's access rights in the system.  Again, we are back to that two-step process. 

This works fine if your security personnel are always at work and constantly checking their emails.  But what happens when they go on vacation for a week and miss all of those emails?  Or when they are at lunch and overlook the email about the terminated employee when they return from their break?  Circumstances like those are the ones we often forget to account for when implementing security systems like Access Control, yet they play a critical role in our organizations' security! 

When choosing to implement a Door Access system, be sure to think about the way that credentials will be activated and deactivated in the system. Ask yourself a few simple questions:

- Is there an easy way to maintain the current database of active cardholders?
- Can you import new employees into the system easily? 
- If you deactivate someone in HR, is there a way for their credential to be automatically deactivated?

No matter what the size of your organization, security is always a concern. The more automated the credentialing process is at your facility, the less likely you are to have issues like the recent security breach at AOL. 

Read the full story about the AOL security breach here.

Lindsay Cornell is the Director of Sales for BadgePass, Inc. BadgePass manufactures cutting edge ID Badging, Visitor Management and Access Control software. Visit www.badgepass.com for more information.

5 Step Plan for Managing Campus Security

No matter what the campus or district size, schools nationwide always ask me, “What is the best place for me to start when putting together a safety and security plan for my district?”  At first, managing campus security can seem like a daunting task.  There are many critical components to keep in mind.  The school districts that I have worked with that have seen the best success have worked through these five steps toward managing their security. 

Step One: Establish a Visual Identification Policy

How are you currently identifying your students, faculty, staff and visitors?  If your campus does not have a visual ID for each one of these people currently, get a plan in place quickly.  Establishing a visual ID is the first step toward a more secure campus.  It offers everyone in the building a sense of security and community.  It also makes faculty feel more comfortable approaching those who aren’t wearing a badge and escorting them to the front office to a visitor check-in station where they can present ID and be assigned a visitor badge. 

Step Two: Do Not Underestimate the Importance of Managing Visitors

Whatever you do, you should not underestimate the importance of identifying your visitors.  Visitors are a critical component to your campus security.  Unidentified visitors can pose a severe threat to any organization or campus and without a record of their name and the time they checked in, you can never account for them having been in your building should an incident ever occur.  By ensuring all visitors check in every time they show up on campus AND wear a visitor badge at all times, you can easily differentiate guests from faculty with just a quick glance at their ID.

Step Three: Conduct Random Assessments to Ensure Everyone is Wearing Their ID

Appoint someone in each school to randomly count how many staff and students they see that aren’t wearing their ID badges.  If the system is being utilized properly, that number should be zero.  I have seen many schools implement penalties for faculty and students seen not wearing their photo ID on school grounds (ex: fines, detentions, etc).  If you implement a badging system and never enforce it after the fact, it will inevitably fall by the wayside.  Random or quarterly assessments help ensure your investment is protected. 

Step Four: Start Thinking about Physical Security

When thinking about physical security, the best place to start is the perimeter.  Can you traffic all of your visitors to one main entry point?  Hopefully you can and all those guests are checking in at your visitor manager station(s).  If you have one main entry point, have you locked down all your other doors during the school day, thereby guaranteeing that you won’t have any unwarranted guests or visitors? 

In the event of an event of emergency, do you have a lockdown or evacuation plan in place?  At this point, you have already implemented student, faculty and visitor identification badges on campus.  Your visitor management system should offer you an accurate list of all of the visitors on campus at any given moment.  If you combine that list with your other credentials, you can come up with a fantastic plan for better managing your evacuation policy and procedures. 

Step Five:  Implement Other Applications that Use Your ID Badges

In this day and age there are so many things you can do with ID badges besides using them as a means for photo identification.  The opportunities are almost endless.  Take your ID card to the next level with applications like access control, vending, cafeteria solutions, mustering, single sign on, etc. 

There are hundreds of applications available to you!  Explore your options and discover new ways to secure your campus and ensure the safety of your students and faculty, keeping in mind that the more integrated the solutions you choose to implement are, the easier they will be to manage. 

There is no guaranteed way to manage campus safety, but following these steps will help to guide you to a safer and more secure district for both students and faculty. 

Lindsay Cornell is the Director of Sales for BadgePass, Inc.  BadgePass manufactures cutting edge ID Badging, Visitor Management and Access Control software.  Visit www.badgepass.com for more information.