Reposted from ArtNet News

As the worst floods in half a century deluge the city of Venice, the city’s cultural institutions are battening down the hatches and bracing for another day of high waters.

Flood levels peaked at 74 inches today, the second-highest level ever recorded, and forecasts suggest those numbers will remain unusually high over the coming days. The city’s historic Saint Mark’s basilica has suffered serious damage, as have many of its cultural institutions. Venice’s mayor, Luigi Brugnaro, has declared a state of emergency and, in a tweet, publicly asked the government to bail out the city, emphasizing that the millions of dollars of flood damage are part of “the effects of climate change.” 

“Venice finds itself now in a state of calamity and alert,” the director of the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Karole PB Vail, tells Artnet News. The modern art museum is located right on the Grand Canal in the city’s Dorsoduro district. “Fortunately, the museum staff is well and safe, the museum and collections are safe and have not been damaged. But for security reasons, and in order to deal with this emergency situation including some damages in the ticket office and shop, the museum is closed to the public today and tomorrow.”

Venice’s 11 city-run institutions also shuttered today. The Fondazione Musei Civici, which manages and develops the cultural and artistic heritage of Venice and the surrounding islands, explains in a statement that it ordered the temporary closure of its venues for cleaning and restoration work, as well as to undertake necessary security measures. “Venice is experiencing an emergency that has not yet ended,” the statement reads.

The worst affected museum is the Ca’Pesaro, which hosts the International Gallery of Modern Art. A short circuit caused a fire that was quickly extinguished by firefighters. But a landing connecting the ground floor to the first floor has been damaged and, while it has not yet collapsed, it requires immediate shoring up. 

Along with the Ca’ Pesaro, the baroque palazzo of the Ca’ Rezzonico, a museum dedicated to 18th-century Venice; the Palazzo Mocenigo; the Casa di Carlo Goldoni; Palazzo Fortuny; and the Museum of Natural History, will all be closed through November 16. 

Fortunately, however, the Museo Correr, Saint Mark’s Clock Tower, the Murano Glass Museum, and the Lace Museum in Burano will reopen tomorrow, although museum cafés and gift shops located on the ground floor will not be accessible for a few days, and the use of the elevators will be temporarily limited, thereby preventing access to wheelchair users. The Palazzo Ducale is slated to reopen on Friday, November 15.

As for some of the city’s other private institutions, the Pinault Collection’s two venues, the Palazzo Grassi and Punta della Dogana, are also staying on the safe side. A spokesman for the exhibition venues tells Artnet News that both will remain closed tomorrow “as a precautionary measure.”

“No damage has been caused to the exhibited artworks, although some necessary steps are required to verify the proper functioning of the systems and services of both venues,” the spokesman says.

The Venice Biennale, which is due to close in just nine days, was forced to shutter its two main exhibitions in the Giardini and the Arsenale, as well as the national pavilions in both venues. A spokeswoman tells Artnet News that they hope they can resume activities tomorrow, but did not immediately respond to inquiries about whether they plan to extend the exhibition’s run.

Meanwhile, the Galleria dell’Accademia, which usually hosts a prized masterpiece by Leonardo da Vinci—the world-famous Vitruvian Man—remained open on November 13. The gallery might be counting its stars that it agreed to loan the gem to the Louvre’s Leonardo blockbuster after all. The gallery could not be reached for comment.

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Reposted from ArtNet News

A brazen attempted heist at London’s Dulwich Picture Gallery was foiled by security on Wednesday night—but the suspect has so far managed to evade capture.

Shortly before midnight, a burglar entered the museum, targeting a pair of works by the Dutch master Rembrandt van Rijn on view in the exhibition “Rembrandt’s Light.” While the intruder did manage to remove the works from the wall, he wasn’t able to successfully spirit them away from the premises.

Police encountered signs of forced entry and quickly located the suspect mid-heist. He sprayed an officer with an unknown substance, according to a statement, and managed to escape without arrest. The officer was not injured.

“This was an audacious attempted burglary and was clearly planned in advance,” Detective Inspector Jason Barber from the Flying Squad, a branch of the London police, said in a statement. “Two paintings in the exhibition were targeted and it was only down to the prompt response of gallery security staff and the courage and swift intervention of officers that these two works of art were not stolen. Thankfully both the paintings were quickly recovered and secured.”

The gallery said the intrusion was identified in part thanks to a new “state-of-the-art” alarm system they installed specifically for this high-profile show. The museum is now working to assess whether the works suffered any damage during the attempted heist.

The museum declined to confirm which works in particular the thief was after, but said that they remain safe and sound. “The intruders were detected by the gallery’s robust security systems and, thanks to the immediate intervention of security staff and the swift response of the Metropolitan Police, the paintings were secured at the scene,” a representative said in a statement.

The show—one of a wave of exhibitions organized to mark the 350th anniversary of the painter’s death around the globe—includes high-profile loans from the Louvre in Paris and the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam.

The exhibition and the gallery at large will remain closed until further notice to allow police to conduct a full investigation.

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Reposted from the New York Times

Personal attacks motivated by bias or prejudice reached a 16-year high in 2018, the F.B.I. said Tuesday, with a significant upswing in violence against Latinos outpacing a drop in assaults targeting Muslims and Arab-Americans.

Over all, the number of hate crimes of all kinds reported in the United States remained fairly flat last year after a three-year increase, according to an annual F.B.I. report. But while crimes against property were down, physical assaults against people were up, accounting for 61 percent of the 7,120 incidents classified as hate crimes by law enforcement officials nationwide.

State and local police forces are not required to report hate crimes to the F.B.I., but the bureau has made a significant effort in recent years to increase awareness and response rates. Still, many cities and some entire states failed to collect or report the data last year, limiting the conclusions that can be drawn from the F.B.I. report.

In addition, experts say that more than half of all victims of hate crimes never file a complaint with the authorities in the first place.

Even so, the F.B.I. said there were 4,571 reported hate crimes against people in 2018, many of them in America’s largest cities, involving victims from a wide range of ethnic and religious backgrounds.

“The trends show more violence, more interpersonal violence, and I think that’s probably reliable,” said James Nolan, a former F.B.I. crime analyst who helped oversee the National Hate Crime Data Collection Program from 1995-2000.

The F.B.I. defines a hate crime as a “criminal offense against a person or property, motivated in whole or in part by an offender’s bias against a race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, ethnicity, gender, or gender identity.” Victims of hate crimes can include institutions, religious organizations and government entities as well as individuals.

Here are the biggest takeaways from the report.

Vandalism is down, but assaults are up.

The 4,571 attacks against people tallied by the bureau for 2018 included aggravated assaults, which were up 4 percent; simple assaults, up 15 percent; and intimidation, up 13 percent.

These trends happened despite a national decline in violent crime in general, and coincided with a 19 percent drop in bias-driven property crimes.

The data points toward a change from young people committing vandalism and other property crimes toward more deliberate attacks on people, said Brian Levin, the director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino, who produced an independent analysis of the F.B.I.’s figures

“We’re seeing a shift from the more casual offender with more shallow prejudices to a bit more of an older assailant who acts alone,” Mr. Levin said. “There’s a diversifying base of groups that are being targeted. We’re getting back to more violence.”

As immigration heats up, Latinos face more violence.

Immigration has replaced terrorism as a top concern in the United States, according to national surveys. That shift appears to be reflected in the hate-crime data, which shows fewer attacks against Muslims and Arab-Americans in recent years, but more against Latinos.

The F.B.I. said 485 hate crimes against Latinos were reported in 2018, up from 430 in 2017. It said 270 crimes were reported against Muslims and Arab-Americans, the fewest since 2014.

But the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a civil rights group with chapters across the country, said it had recorded 1,664 hate crimes against Muslims in 2018.

Robert McCaw, the group’s director of governmental affairs, said that while awareness and reporting of hate crimes have improved, daily acts of bullying or discriminations in schools, workplaces and in public are not included in the F.B.I.’s analysis, which focused on violent crimes.

“We don’t know the full scope of anti-Muslim hate crimes and other hate crimes,” he said.

Hate crimes against Latinos were at their highest level since 2010, when the unemployment rate and border crossings from Mexico were both peaking. Some advocates placed the blame for the recent rise on President Trump. 

“There’s a direct correlation between the hate speech and fear-mongering coming from President Trump and the right wing of the Republican Party with the increase in attacks against Latinos,” said Domingo Garcia, the national president of the League of United Latin American Citizens.

Mr. Garcia said that immigration had replaced terrorism as the new “bogeyman” for the American right and predicted that the rise in hate crimes would not stop until the harsh rhetoric against Latinos had ended.

Hate crimes have increased in America’s largest cities.

Although nationwide F.B.I. data for all of 2019 won’t be available until next November, the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism examined hate-crime reports so far this year in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago and found that all three cities — plus the nation’s capital — appear to be headed for decade highs.

Hate crimes against Asian-Americans, African-Americans and Muslims are down in New York, the center said, but reports of anti-Semitic hate crimes are driving the overall total up.

Of the 364 hate crimes reported in New York through Nov. 3, the center said, 148 targeted Jewish people. There were 295 hate crimes reported in the city over the comparable period in 2018.

“The surge of attacks on the Jewish community, in large cities like New York and in smaller cities like Pittsburgh and Poway, really has no precedent,” said Jonathan Greenblatt, chief executive of the Anti-Defamation League, referring to deadly shootings at a synagogue in Pittsburgh last year and one near San Diego in April.

“The severity of these incidents seems to be increasing in both their aggressiveness and physicality,” he added.

In Los Angeles, 249 hate crimes were reported in the first nine months of 2019, up from 217 in the same period last year. And Chicago had 77 reported hate crimes through early November, compared with 78 for the whole of 2018.

Most places reported zero hate crimes to the F.B.I.

The great majority — 87 percent — of the 16,039 law enforcement agencies that sent data to the F.B.I. for 2018 said no hate crimes were reported in their jurisdiction during the year. Twenty-five cities with populations of more than 150,000 people reported no hate crimes, including Plano and Laredo, Tex.; Newark; St. Petersburg, Fla.; and Madison, Wis.

No hate crimes were reported by any law enforcement agency in Alabama or Wyoming.

Mr. Nolan, the former F.B.I. analyst, said he and his colleagues had sought to improve the accuracy of hate crime data, but with little success. “It was all lip service; it was never funded,” he said.

Compiling crime statistics is not one of the bureau’s major priorities, Mr. Nolan said, though the former director, James Comey, tried to elevate the task, saying in 2014 about tracking hate crimes: “It is not something we can ignore or sweep under the rug.”

Mr. Nolan said the spottiness of the data doesn’t invalidate attempts to determine which types of hate crimes are on the rise, though. “All crimes are underreported; it doesn’t make them useless that they’re underreported,” he said. “You have to be savvy enough to look at the trend lines and see the trends. It tells you something about what’s going on.”

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Reposted from ArtNet News

A man suspected of being involved in the infamous 1990 heist at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston has been released from prison. David Turner, 52, was freed yesterday after serving 21 years in prison for a separate planned robbery of an armored car depot, which was foiled by the FBI in 1999.

Turner isn’t one of the two men identified by the FBI as the actual robbers. George Reissfelder and Lenny DiMuzio are believed to have posed as police officers to gain access to the museum, tying up security guards and stealing 13 historic artworks by the likes of Johannes Vermeer and Rembrandt van Rijn worth an estimated $500 million. It remains the most valuable art crime in the nation’s history.

But Turner worked for local crime lord Carmello Merlino, the man suspected of having arranged the high-profile theft. Merlino died in prison in 2005, and DiMuzio and Resissfelder both died within a year of the Gardner robbery.

The FBI told Turner he was a Gardner suspect, and that he would receive leniency if he helped solve the crime, according to the Associated Press.

At the time of his sentencing, Turner wrote a letter to Boston Magazine denying his involvement in the museum heist.

“They think that I was the person who committed the robbery, which is false,” he said. “They thought that if I was facing serious charges, I would be motivated to help facilitate the return of the paintings. Well, they got the serious charges against me, and now I am going to die in prison.”

Nevertheless, in 2016, the Boston Globe reported that Turner’s 38-year sentence had been reduced by seven years, speculating that the judge had done so in return for information connected to the stolen paintings.

In 2010, Turner wrote a letter from prison to Connecticut mobster Robert Gentile, long suspected of having information about the paintings’ whereabouts, asking him to help recover the artwork. Despite failing health and FBI raids on his home, Gentile has steadfastly denied knowledge of the crime. He was released from prison, where he was serving time on unrelated gun charges, in March.

With the reduction of his sentence, Turner was slated for release in 2025, but Judge Richard G. Stearns, who also presided over Turner’s original trial, vacated his prison term last month thanks to recent Supreme Court rulings that have changed federal sentencing guidelines.

At this week’s hearing, Stearns sentenced Turner to time served and placed him on probation for three years, noting that he “has done what I would expect from someone who did want to change his life,” according to the Globe.

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Reposted from Campus Safety

During a campus emergency, time is of the essence. Communication during a crisis needs to be fast and accurate so that people can react quickly and appropriately. While the advent of text message alerts has increased the ability to reach individuals directly, texts and traditional audio announcements don’t allow for any visual components in mass communications.

Unlike text messages and emails – which can take several minutes to show up on a device, and require someone to be checking their phone regularly and/or have the sound turned on – emergency alerts on digital signage appear within seconds. Additionally, our brains process graphics faster than text, and motion catches the eye, so bright messages with moving HD graphics reach more people faster.

Since the content of all digital displays across a campus can be controlled remotely from a single Internet-enabled device, emergency evacuations can be handled in a swift and tactical fashion. Ideally, a digital signage notification system would integrate fully with the audio and text message components, so that messages and updates are consistent and cast the widest net possible.

While security is not always its primary use on a campus, digital signage’s versatility can service a wide variety of needs. Using it as a central element in emergency communications is another step toward ensuring a solid return on a school, university or healthcare facility’s investment.

Why You Should Use Existing Infrastructure for Emergency Alerts

By design, campus administrators install eye-catching direct-view LED screens with crisp, bright visuals in the most heavily trafficked locations all across campus, such as touchscreen directories in classroom buildings, conference room collaboration boards, and digital displays in libraries, cafeterias, waiting rooms and other buildings.

This informational and wayfinding signage doubles as a built-in mass notification network during emergencies. Digital signage alert systems allow institutions of higher education to maintain regulatory compliance with the Clery Act, which requires colleges provide students and employees with a notification upon confirmation of a significant emergency, incident or crime impacting the campus community and/or surrounding area. Federation for Internet Alerts data also can be implemented into signage systems, which gives schools, universities and hospitals real-time data in a matter of seconds. Weather alerts and Amber Alerts hit screens to immediately notify the entire audience, which is crucial for campuses.

With this public-facing technology, campus officials are also able to inform those who opt-out of any direct-to-individual messages, like texts and emails. Unlike audio announcements, the visuals also allow hearing-impaired individuals to receive the information in the moment. Most modern commercial displays also have the ability to add on additional computing power, such as a Raspberry Pi unit, which can support more visual, attention-grabbing messages.

The beauty of using modern display technology for emergency alerts is that administrators are no longer limited to sending one text-based message to an entire campus. With some strategic forethought and planning, digital signage can deliver specific, unique information based on the location of the display.

Deliver Unique Geo-Specific Messages

Ideally, digital signage solutions across campus are cloud-based and can be accessed from any Internet-connected device, so administrators are not tied to a specific location when sending alerts and providing real-time updates to an entire campus. The system will thus need to include a powerful network management platform to manage and deliver content that can be overridden in the event of an emergency.

Using a cloud-based network, officials can send geo-specific messages to digital displays across campus, with different messages based on the type and location of the incident, as well as the location of the display. For these examples, we’ll imagine a tornado is approaching campus around midday.

CAMPUS FOOD COURT: Often, modern campus dining halls are reminiscent of mall food courts: a plethora of delectable options at different stations, each with multiple 4K digital displays aligned horizontally to show menus and mouthwatering images of the day’s special. Large HD displays surround diners on walls outside the food court leading to an attached building – which, on a normal day, show information about campus events, announcements, photos, and more. However, these two types of displays play different roles in an emergency.

The campus community hears a tornado siren and starts trying to figure out where to go. Using the cloud-based network, campus personnel execute pre-planned programs to send tailored messages to the displays around the food court and play a sound. The menu displays switch to a color background that starkly contrasts with its surroundings and displays a series of messages and graphics – including text explaining the incoming weather with a flashing graphic of a tornado, followed by instructions and a large map to direct pedestrians to the nearest safe spots.

The displays surrounding the dining area and adjacent building then simultaneously serve as wayfinding guides, leading students and employees to safe areas in an orderly fashion.

LIBRARY: Libraries are tech hubs on college campuses. Not only do they house commercial displays showing announcements and events, but there are also hundreds of computer monitors for students to work on, as well as breakout rooms with collaboration technology and touchscreen directories at the entrances.

When the tornado sirens go off, students, faculty and staff members in the library hear audio messaging – typically a sound followed by a voice giving instructions – and both the displays on the walls and the library computers display emergency messages and video instructions (although the monitors would not be entirely overridden, to save valuable work). Touch displays that normally present an interactive library directory can act as an information center or communication device. Individuals working in solitude in the less-trafficked “stacks” are alerted via an emergency sound; displays direct them to the common area, or show instructions specific to their floor – where to go, whether or not to take the stairs, or even to stay put if they are on the lower floors.

STUDENT HEALTH CENTERS & HOSPITALS: Displays in health facilities typically include wait times and informational monitors. In a campus-wide emergency, the versatility of these monitors becomes crucial. If there are injured or sick people piling in, the instructions for pedestrians entering the building need to be clear and accurate. The displays around the waiting room should clarify what’s going on, with as much visual information as possible.

During the tornado, the facility would first receive and display the messages to get to safety. However, after the event, the communications become more strategic. Waiting room screens should shift gears to provide specific directions for those who have been injured.

Digital Signage Can Be Deployed in Multiple Locations

Similarly tailored messaging also can be sent to displays in residence halls and student unions, and even to the outdoor signage scattered throughout campus and stadiums. Following an emergency, the signage should then shift to providing information to victims on who to contact or where to go, as well as where folks can donate items for those in need. Digital signage is ideal for disseminating this information throughout campus, providing a helpful resource to a shaken community.

The key is that each display’s strengths are employed to complement additional emergency communications; in the above example, the cafeteria’s menu boards are used to display the most important information because they are above eye level and easier to read in a crowd. They’re also larger and able to host more information. Similarly, the consistent layout of wall signage throughout campus makes these displays ideal for wayfinding and disseminating general information.

A general best practice is that the emergency message should always look the same and appear in the same place on the screen, regardless of where each screen is physically located. Because the screens are primarily used for non-emergency messaging, it is important to always keep that content fresh. Before an emergency ever happens, campus officials can encourage people to engage with the displays by posting ever-changing, interesting content, so students and employees develop a habit of looking at them. Then, in an emergency, they’ll naturally look to the bright, eye-catching displays for information.

Make Action Plans Smarter through Analytics

Modern display technology can also help inform emergency communication protocols through analytics. Vendor-provided programs can provide new, interesting information for administrators and disaster planners. Discrete cameras gather non-identifying information about those who engage with the signage and gather valuable analytics that campus officials can use to see which displays receive the most engagement. This is useful for determining what messages are effective day-to-day by tracking data like impressions and engagement time. In emergencies, this information becomes even more important.

Through this type of platform, administrators can learn which areas have the highest foot traffic and at what times throughout the day, as well as advanced, non-identifying data analytics about the demographics of the individuals. This information can be cross-referenced with existing data like class schedules to allow officers and personnel to make data-driven decisions while responding to emergencies.

For example, if an incident occurs near an area that normally sees heavy student traffic at that hour of the day, administrators would be able to consider this as they move quickly to form evacuation plans. It’s important to determine who will be in charge of creating and pushing out content, and the various levels of access and approval each person has.

Through careful, data-backed planning, college and hospital administrators can implement a robust emergency communications plan that uses an integrated approach, with digital signage at the core, in order to enable a quick and orderly response.

No disaster or emergency affects everyone the same, and the versatility of a digital signage notification system counters the chaos that comes with crises. It takes time to design a plan with all of the bases covered. But, once it’s done, the “set-it-and-forget-it” nature of digital signage allows campus personnel to focus on helping students and faculty get to safety, rather than the notifications in the moment.

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Reposted from Northern States Conservation Center
by Joan Baldwin, originally printed in Leadership Matters

I don't know about you, but when I am besieged with obligations, meetings, and deadlines, I make lists. Over time the lists become a bit of a joke because things that weren't accomplished one week don't always move forward to the next. Instead they occupy a sort of list purgatory, haunting me as I go about my days. You may have a better way of organizing things. Your lists may be digital. Perhaps you're more efficient, but however you make your way through your tasks, there is always a certain satisfaction in the strike-through, marking something as done, finished, complete, and off your plate for a while.

But then, and maybe this doesn't happen to you, there is another sort of list. It's the list from 30,000 feet. It's always with me, a reminder of ways of being, things I need to focus on, ways I need to be more intentional. This week Anne Ackerson and I read papers from our Johns Hopkins University students regarding leadership at museums, zoos, and heritage organizations undergoing challenge and change. As I read them--many discuss museums that have been in the news for one thing or another--I am struck again, by how complex leadership is, how many moving parts there are, and how important it is that the personal integrate with the organizational.

As I've said here about a million times, reflection in leadership is key. So in that spirit, here are 10 things on my 30,000-foot leadership list for this fall.

1. Remembering to pause: whether it's going outside for 15 minutes for a walk; sitting with a non-work friend over coffee; laughing. Life isn't all work.
2. Understanding my organization's origin story: Acknowledging the work, gifts, and goals of those who came before me, while moving forward in a world that's changed and changing, and creating a way to make the two work together.
3. Listening: Spending part of every day, not waiting to speak, but actually listening.
4. Remembering not to judge: Trying to make my go-to be to understand, to empathize, and to be present rather than to judge.
5. Acknowledging accomplishments: You've all probably read about Anne's accomplishment jar. I am thinking about creating a team accomplishment jar where our program can acknowledge its best moments over the course of the year. Sometimes it does take a village.
6. Making my observations my obligation: Standing up for injustice, for inequity, for the minor--the constant interrupter in staff meetings who rides herd over more reserved colleagues--to the major--the colleague who's bullied or harassed.
7. Looking for the through-lines, whether in history, race, gender, environment and class: I work with a collection created by white men in a different age, for a different age. I need to re-center, educate, and through acquisition bring community and collection into alignment.
8. Give back to the field: In many ways I've been very, very lucky. I've managed to make a living, to use my imagination, to work in beautiful places, surrounded by interesting collections. I must always give back, pay it forward, and help those following behind.
9. Make sure everyone's at the table: From the board to the front-line staff, make sure we represent our communities. And then do my best to make sure all voices are heard equitably, whether in an exhibition or a staff meeting.
10. Values permeate the workplace too: While values are important in the front of the house--see #7--they are also important in our workspaces. Leaders content to ignore inequitable pay and benefits are leaders perpetuating the worst kind of patriarchal system. See #6.

Your list may be different, but I hope you have one. Having one fuels forward movement and change.

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Reposted from Security Magazine

Security can take multiple forms. There’s physical security, cybersecurity, and of course, security as it relates to workplace safety.

That last one is of paramount importance from both a moral standpoint and a business standpoint. It’s unethical to knowingly put employee and/or client lives on the line. Negligence can cost organizations a pretty penny in court, and especially in the wake of the mass shootings that have occurred in current and former places of employment this year, workplace violence is an issue that can’t be taken lightly.

Security leaders know this. They know training employees on how to respond to an active shooter is important. And at the same time, they also know they need to take proactive steps to ensure employees never have to use that training.

Modern technology can help, using continuous evaluation to go beyond the pre-hire background check and make leaders aware of behaviors that are cause for concern.

This approach is built upon the fact that disengaged employees are grown, not hired. In other words, the superstar applicant who gets the job won’t necessarily be the exact same person after their first week, month, or year with the company. That’s simply because no one can predict the life events that may occur over time, nor how each individual will cope with the particularly challenging ones.

What leaders can predict are the behavioral outcomes associated with certain signs of stress – someone who is irritable, argumentative, withdrawn, depressed, etc. These signs can be picked up by continuous evaluation, then be used to spur business leaders into interventional action so adverse outcomes are never realized.

Permission for continuous evaluation can be incorporated into the employee onboarding process to enable ongoing checks for risky activities that employees may be engaging in outside of work. This comes in handy in situations where an employee is arrested for a misdemeanor or minor felony that employers won’t be alerted to unless an employee tells them.

A transportation company recently saw the benefits of such ongoing discovery. When they continuously monitored 10,000 of their drivers, they uncovered nine new convictions and 10 new arrests in just the first 30 days – including cases of 2^nd degree kidnapping, assault, aggravated battery, domestic violence and driving under the influence, to which they were unaware.  

When focused specifically on preventing a workplace shooting, cases like these are especially relevant. In multiple instances, domestic violence has been a precursor to more aggressive, tragic, public attacks.

There are other warning signs, too, some of which can only come from the observations of others. That’s why some continuous evaluation platforms allow for individuals to – with or without anonymity – report suspicious activities they see or hear about at work, like someone being verbally or physically abusive to a coworker or client. These contributions create a more holistic view of an employee’s behavior and help leaders better determine whether someone poses a serious threat to the business and the individuals it serves.

In certain cases (e.g., serious crime), termination may be the only appropriate outcome. That’s why the best continuous evaluation platforms integrate leadership across Human Resources and Legal.

But in instances where discovery occurs early, actions can be taken to course correct behavior– as would be the case if an employee with no related criminal history starts to randomly act out. This is where leaders can encourage HR to step in, having them engage that employee and initiate a conversation about what has prompted their change in behavior. If applicable, they can also make suggestions regarding how to improve it.

Before stress-induced, disgruntled behaviors turn in to potentially life-threatening acts of workplace violence, HR has the ability to intervene if they can discover risk early. For example, an employee about whom coworkers have expressed concern may explain to HR that they’re struggling with their workload or are having a difficult time working with a particular coworker. Both of these issues are directly within HR’s purview, and can potentially be solved by having a supervisor take some responsibility off their plate, or by bringing both individuals in to discuss more efficient interactions.

HR can even intervene if the issues stem from problems at home. Many companies have employee-assistance programs and referral resources that can help individuals who are struggling with their finances or overall health and wellness.

In thinking about how security leaders can ensure businesses are a safe space for productivity and professionalism, the alarming trend of workplace shootings have primed leaders to automatically host active shooter response training. Security leaders need to know that this is just the start. The best approach to active-shooter prevention takes things one step further, into the realm of continuous evaluation, early discovery and, as a result, timely intervention

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Reposted from Computer Weekly

Brits over the age of 30 tend to be more likely to adopt best practice when it comes to cyber security than their younger colleagues, even though the under-30s tend to be more anxious about security matters, according to a study conducted by NTT’s cyber unit.

The study, which also looked into the attitudes of people in multiple other countries, was conducted as part of NTT’s Risk:Value report 2019, and scored across 17 criteria. In the UK, over-30s scored higher in terms of security best practice than the under-30s. When compared with people in the other countries studied, which included Brazil, France, Hong Kong and the US, people in the UK tended to score higher regardless of age.

The study cannot be read as an indictment of the habits of millennials (those born between approximately 1980 and 1995) because the oldest millennials are now approaching the age of 40. However, its findings do clearly show that just because people have grown up as digital natives and are aware of the risks of life online, it does not necessarily mean they are paragons of virtue when it comes to security.

Indeed, suggested NTT, employees who have spent longer in the workplace gaining knowledge and skills – what it termed “digital DNA” – have a clear advantage over their younger colleagues.

“It’s clear from our research that a multigenerational workforce leads to very different attitudes to cyber security. This is a challenge when organisations need to engage across all age groups, from the oldest employee to the youngest,” said NTT Security’s vice-president of consulting for the UK and Ireland, Azeem Aleem.

“With technology constantly evolving and workers wanting to bring in and use their own devices, apps and tools, business leaders must ensure that security is an enabler and not a barrier to a productive workplace.

“Our advice for managing security within a multigenerational workforce is to set expectations with young people and make security awareness training mandatory. Then execute this training to test your defences, with all company employees involved in simulation exercises,” said Aleem.

“Finally, teamwork is key. The corporate security team is not one person, but the whole company, so cultural change is important to get right.”

The research revealed that under-30s expected to be more productive, flexible and agile at work using their own tools and devices, but half thought that responsibility for security rested solely on the shoulders of the IT department – 6% higher than older age groups.

One anonymised interviewee, a 28-year old working in the finance sector, commented: “I don’t think I care anymore. There is so much stuff out there now, what with Cambridge Analytica. It is all out there, I accept that at some point someone might try to defraud me and impersonate me and I will deal with it when it happens, I suppose.”

Young risk takers

The report seemed to show younger workers were more ready to take risks – 52% said they’d consider paying a ransomware demand, compared with 26% of over-30s. But 58% believed their employers did not have the right in-house skills or resources to cope with the number of security threats, compared with just 26% of older adults.

Younger people also tended to dramatically underestimate the amount of time it would take to recover from a cyber security breach, and were less likely than their older colleagues to believe cyber should be a regular item on the boardroom agenda.

However, younger people did consider the internet of things (IoT) as a greater security risk than the over-30s.

Adam Joinson, professor of information systems at the University of Bath – who specialises in the intersection of IT and human behaviour – said that if the report made anything clear, it was that there is no such thing as a one-size-fits-all approach to security.

“The insights from the NTT study demonstrate that treating all employees as posing the same risk, or having the same skills, is problematic for organisations. We do need to be careful not to assume that the under-30s simply don’t care so much about cyber security. While this may be true in some cases, in others it is more likely that existing security policies and practices don’t meet their expectations about ‘stuff just working’,” he said.

“If we want to harness the fantastic creativity and energy of younger workers, we need to think about security as something that enables their work, not something that blocks them from achieving their tasks. This is likely to mean security practitioners having to fundamentally rethink the way security policies operate, and find ways to improve the fit between security and the tasks employees are required to undertake as part of their core work,” added Joinson.

To this end, NTT has produced a checklist of six best practice tips to reinforce security in a multigenerational workforce. These are to:

1. Make security culture inclusive of all age groups and supported by age-diverse “champions”.
2. Listen to the views of younger employees on cyber.
3. Enable agile and flexible workplaces that help younger people buy into the desired security culture.
4. Make security leaders approachable to everyone in the business.
5. Support learning programmes, mentoring and even external support in areas where skills shortages are most acute.
6. Educate, possibly even through tactics such as gamification.

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Reposted from Security Management

The scope of security’s responsibility within organizations continues to broaden, and increasingly it includes such areas as risk management, business continuity, and cybersecurity.

That’s one finding of joint research from Security Management and Resolver, research which was the subject of a webinar earlier this month moderated by ASIS IT Security Council Chair Jess Sieben, CPP, CISSP. Sieben, who also is corporate security product manager at Resolver, was joined by his colleagues Ryan Thiessen and Anaud Ganpaul on Using Data to Allocate Your Security Resources, which is available for free on-demand by registering.

Looking at security budgets, the study showed that while the typical budget for cybersecurity is seeing larger increases, both cyber and physical security budgets are on the rise: Physical Security Budge up 56% and Cybersecurity Budget up 78%.

Ganpaul cites this a positive development: “This is good news as one of the concerns we’ve been hearing is that the budget for the cybersecurity team can starve that physical security budget. But the data shows that they are continuing to fund both at the levels that they require.”

While still more than 50 percent, the study indicated that the budget allocation for staff was falling while the budget allocated to equipment and software rose.

The survey also examined the relative number and import of the incidents with which the security team dealt with in the previous year. These incidents led to an average loss of $3.5 million per company in the study. They survey, and webinar, wrap up by examining the tools companies used to track incidents and mitigate future risk.

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Reposted from Security Management

If you look closely, you’ll start noticing it everywhere: the long, brightly-lit walkway with well-maintained vegetation along the sides, the line of stone benches running along the perimeter of a building in a popular tourist area, or the Instagram-worthy sculptures and architectural elements thoughtfully placed throughout an urban park.

These carefully constructed public spaces have components designed to delight and enhance the experience of the people who use them—but they also employ natural security techniques honed over decades to subtly create a safer space for all.

This approach, known as crime prevention through environmental design (CPTED), was first introduced in the 1970s and has steadily gained popularity since. Today, CPTED is a common component of physical security and architectural design—and for good reason. Urban areas are constantly evolving to support the influx of city dwellers; more than half of the world’s population lives in urban areas today, and that number is expected to increase, according to the United Nations. That growth, combined with the recent increase in soft target threats such as vehicle attacks and mass shootings, makes security in densely populated areas crucial.

However, the challenges faced by security practitioners to harden public spaces are numerous—the cost, the difficulty of retrofitting an existing area with new physical security components, and the implications that come with an increased visible security presence. This is where CPTED is especially useful, says Mark Schreiber, CPP, principal consultant of Safeguards Consulting, Inc., who is involved in ASIS standards development and multiple councils.

“CPTED is a whole other set of tools where we could apply security design to facilities but, instead of applying technology or a specific hardware, CPTED addresses overall facility design itself,” Schreiber says. “It’s important for security design aspects to be teaming up with other types of design—with landscape, civil, and structural engineering and physical security technology. We’re changing the physical environment that a human goes through and influencing the human’s behavior through those designs themselves, whether it’s outdoors or indoors, because that environment influences behavior naturally. People know when they feel safe, and a criminal knows where they’re more likely to get away with a crime because of the environment.”

While the basic principles of CPTED outlined in the 1970s remain the same today, they have become more nuanced—the approach is a careful balance of physical security, architecture, psychology, and perception. Successful implementation of CPTED components in public areas requires equal input between the landscape architects twho are designing a layout and the security principles needed to build a safe environment.

But for landscape architects, security is just one component of a larger plan. They also need to consider accessibility, aesthetics, municipal requirements, and resiliency—all of which need to be incorporated into one solution. While security and urban design often have differing—and, at times, clashing—approaches to how public spaces should be protected, the final result, when done well, is a seamless experience that leaves visitors feeling at ease.

“There are these fantastic themes of visitor use and experience, as well as public safety,” says Jill Cavanaugh, a partner at Beyer Blinder Belle Architects & Planners (BBB) in Washington, D.C.—a city full of national landmarks and tourist attractions.

“We always keep in the forefront of our mind that dichotomy and our obligation to ensure that when visitors leave these landmarks that they’re not taking away a sense of foreboding—you want them to feel safe and protected, but you don’t want to have that experience diminish their overall enjoyment of these landmarks,” says Cavanaugh.

Designing a Mall for the People

Cavanaugh and the architects at BBB have plenty of experience designing for some of the United States’ most stringent security requirements—following 9/11, they were tasked with increasing the safety of several national landmarks, including Smithsonian Institution museums, many of which line the National Mall in Washington, D.C.

“Because of the nature of the public spaces, monuments, and important buildings within the city, they all became vulnerable in so many ways, and there was a big need for them to be protected,” explains Hany Hassan, partner and director of BBB’s Washington, D.C., office. “We developed a comprehensive plan for the entire Mall with the intention to provide necessary security while being mindful of the quality, aesthetics, and historic nature of those buildings. We had to do it in a way that wouldn’t compromise the Mall’s symbolic nature of openness, freedom, and accessibility.”

While security in the design was a top priority due to the buildings’ locations and symbolic importance, the architects had to keep other design aspects in mind.

“Our approach has to be dynamic enough to accommodate the things that oftentimes we can’t control,” Cavanaugh says. “The buildings in which we work are in dense urban areas, so we don’t have the luxury of a setback. How do you appropriately harden a building physically in a way that honors the aspects of the building that make it significant? We really maintain what makes the building special from a historic or aesthetic point of view, but [we] incorporate measures that are often invisible but do include the appropriate amount of structural resilience and electronic intrusion resistance.”

Scott Archer, a senior associate at BBB, tells Security Management that urban plans often incorporate a layered security approach, which is both more effective and less noticeable, ensuring that organizations are not relying on a single line of defense to stop all threats.

“The new visitor pavilion we designed for the Washington Monument isn’t designed to protect against a vehicle ramming, because that’s being protected against elsewhere,” says Archer. “This layered approach not only helps the user feel safe while still navigating those spaces with ease, but also allows the security apparatus to actually defend against things in a more discreet way. You can’t make it completely transparent in the way that it’s designed because you don’t want others to know what level of threat it’s designed to. It’s about the balance between allowing people to feel safe knowing that they’re protected without describing the level of protection.”

The results of BBB’s approach can be seen along the Mall today—but only to the careful observer. That marble ledge that’s the perfect place to sit while waiting in line to enter a museum also serves as a retaining wall and a barrier. The eye-catching sculpture that marks the entrance to the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History is reinforced to act as a bollard. A facility’s intricate wooden entryway may house a magnetometer. And there are many design components that meet strict federal security requirements and are almost impossible to detect—a slight slope of the sidewalk, unimposing vegetation, or a carefully placed trash can far from a building’s entrance.

“One of the best compliments we have received on this kind of work is that people didn’t even notice that there is perimeter security,” Hassan says. “When we do any of these projects, it’s not an exercise of flexing our muscles in designing an elaborate system—we want it to be nearly invisible.”

Internationally, though, the design approach might be less subtle. Cavanaugh, who leads many U.S. State Department projects overseas, explains that sometimes a facility’s security features should be showcased, not hidden.

“On these campuses, we always have perimeter security that looks like perimeter security, so that there’s a definite visual message to any visitor, whether friendly or unfriendly, that this is a protected U.S. military installation, even though it’s a diplomatic presence,” Cavanaugh says. “It’s important to emphasize security as a visual element but also have that diplomatic layer of encouraging visitors whose only interface with the United States might be through that post.”

A Team Approach

As CPTED best practices have become more widely understood throughout many industries, it is easier to work together to make design decisions among a multidisciplinary group, Schreiber notes.

“The great thing about CPTED is that it’s not a big lift—it’s relatively simple to implement because there’s not a lot of friction with the design process when you have trained professionals in the group,” Schreiber says. “Ultimately, it requires a team approach, proper education, and experience to implement CPTED. Common CPTED training programs educate a wide variety of people—security engineers and consultants, managers, architects, law enforcement professionals, and city planners. What it comes down to is that the principles are applicable to many different physical environments, including the built environment, and whoever is influencing that environment can use it in that case.”

Cavanaugh agrees, noting that the interactions between architects and security professionals often have a healthy tension to them that can result in innovative solutions that will satisfy everyone.

For example, Cavanaugh says: “If you have a challenge where you need a certain perimeter distance for a vehicle, there are many different ways you could work with the landscape to accomplish the same security objective. Those are some of the most fruitful dialogues because security professionals might perceive the solution to be a wall or fence, but there are other ways to address the issue and how to resolve it.”

Schreiber notes that ASIS is working with the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) to develop internationally agreed upon guidelines for CPTED best practices.

“We have made significant progress in making this standard into something that can be practically applied to any organization, including main CPTED principles and guidance that can be implemented,” Schreiber says.

Evolving with the Industry

Hassan says that the changes in physical security technology and the threats facilities face influence how the architects incorporate security into their designs. The evolution of x-ray and other screening technology, for example, allows architects to incorporate those security measures into the facility more seamlessly for clients seeking to create a more welcoming environment, he adds.

“The equipment is no longer as unsightly or intrusive, but more importantly we can now make the building more inviting when you enter, as opposed to being confronted with equipment when you step in the door,” Hassan says.

The constantly changing threat landscape is a challenge, especially when designing for a historic building that can’t be completely revamped to address new security concerns, he notes.

“What we hear from our clients is to design to the threat, but that’s always evolving,” Hassan says. “As much as we are trying to improve the systems and equipment we use, at the same time others trying to do harm are coming up with new ideas and ways to surpass that. It’s a constant challenge and competition between everybody to be able to protect ourselves from anyone trying to do any harm.”

This is where resiliency in a building’s design is especially important.

“When we’re designing places, whether it’s an urban landscape or a building, often these are giant monetary and time investments, so they usually aren’t temporary,” Archer explains. “Think about the longevity of an embassy overseas—that should ideally last for more than 100 years, but then the threat will be completely different. How we design in flexibility is really important, and we do that not just for security but for all types of issues within the building. We try to think about our master plans and our urban design as an exhibition of how this can come together in a way that makes sense for today and lays the landscape for how it might change over time without having to restart every 50 years.”

When it comes to resiliency, the architects take a holistic view about the mark they will make on structures that have existed for hundreds of years and, hopefully, will continue to serve the public for years to come.

“Solving security in design is one-dimensional, and when the threat changes it becomes antiquated,” Cavanaugh says. “If it’s solving more than one problem, though—if we’re layering in an infrastructure upgrade, bringing the building out of the flood plain by raising it 30 inches, and also accomplishing a vehicular barrier and incorporating accessibility—all of these things make design more resilient to both time and purpose. That’s where we find the most enjoyment: a multidimensional design that solves more than one problem in a way that’s sensible but also intuitive and will be more enduring in the way that people use it in the years to come.”

A Bird’s Eye View of Washington, D.C.

The Washington Monument—the striking obelisk-like structure perched on top of a hill overlooking the National Mall in Washington, D.C.—is one of the United States’ most distinct landmarks, but it was closed in 2016 for structural repairs and only reopened last month. The architects at Beyer Blinder Belle Architects and Planners (BBB) were tasked with building a new structure at the base of the monument to screen visitors before they ascend to the top of the tower.

The architects had a vision of an open, welcoming pavilion with glass walls and ceilings that would not hinder the 360-degree view from the monument. Melding this approach with the stringent security standards required for federal landmarks, though, made it one of the most challenging projects the firm has worked on, says Hany Hassan, partner and director of BBB’s Washington, D.C. office.

“We wanted to design the entrance in a way that reflects what the monument symbolizes, which is openness, freedom, and safety, and wanted people to be able to enter in a dignified way,” Hassan explains. “We went through a very arduous design process to develop multiple plans. In order to create that sense of dignity, we designed and developed a glass pavilion that is transparent, so you can actually see through it when you enter and look up towards the monument, so you’re never disconnected from that experience.”

BBB partner Jill Cavanaugh explains that the message the structure sends is intended to foster both accessibility and an understanding of the pavilion’s main purpose: security.

“The National Park Service wanted something that would convey that you are entering a screening facility, so in some ways it had to look purposeful while also incorporating discreet elements that the public doesn’t necessarily need to know,” Cavanaugh says. “Ultimately, we adopted a design that deliberately used glass so that it had a lighter touch that allowed people inside the security queue to look up and see the top of the monument.”

The architects acknowledged the challenges that came with designing a glass building to meet ballistic and blast requirements.

“We really put a lot of effort into the design to ensure that it was technically adequate, but we always go back to that visitor experience so we ensured that there’s daylight, there are views toward the Washington Monument and the monuments around you, while you’re up in that particular area waiting to get into the building,” Cavanaugh says.

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