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Extending perimeter security across vertical markets

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cargo portThe week before last, we discussed the importance of airport perimeter security in response to the Mineta San Jose Airport breach in our blog called "Ramping Up Perimeter Security at Airports", but there are many other organizations and industries that incorporate perimeter intrusion detection systems (PIDS) as part of a holistic security strategy. 

Like airports, security directors in other transportation realms and a broad range of vertical markets such as education, energy and utilities, healthcare, and more, want to be assured that they are rapidly alerted when potential intrusions or unusual activities in and around their boundaries occur. For example: 

  • Ports - Massive waterways and channels leading into ports must remain open to boat traffic and cargo vessels. Because of the size and area of these bodies of water, they are particularly difficult to secure and susceptible to vulnerabilities. Ports such as the Port of Freeport  on the Gulf Coast in Texas, United States, use vessel-radar systems to identify small crafts or other unsuspecting anomalies, and automate pan-tilt-zoom (PTZ) functions on video surveillance cameras to have instant video verification.
     
  • Utilities and City-Wide Municipal Services - In a city, securing water treatment plants, power stations, oil and gas rigs or piping is critical to safeguarding citizens and maintaining the infrastructure that allows a community to properly function. These service providers unify video surveillance with microwave or fence detection sensors to know the second an unauthorized entry is detected to prevent potential disaster. 
     
  • University Campuses - One of our prominent education customers advocates the importance of protecting outlying perimeters and specific areas on campus when a fence or physical barrier is not practical or affordable. They found balance in providing public access and securing grounds by combining video surveillance and PIDS to detect unusual activities during evening hours. 

Extending perimeter security - Water treatmentWhat is the commonality of these organizations beyond PIDS?
By unifying their security platform to act as a central point of information and control for all security and intrusion-related events, these vertical organizations are achieving greater 'correlative' situational awareness to monitor open, widespread grounds or waterways. 

Whether for airports, seaports, water treatment and electrical utilities or campuses, the outer lying perimeters must be monitored and secured. The correlative data derived from a unified security platform helps to reduce false alarms and keep these properties, people and assets safe.