Find news and information for the executive corporate security director, CSO, facility manager and assets protection manager on issues of policy, products, incidents, risk management, threat assessments and preparedness.
Issue link: http://sdi.epubxp.com/i/941796
Understanding the IT Managed Services Model Overall, the security industry needs to better understand – and catch up with – the nature of today's technology and how it is managed in the IT domain. at means using digital tools and electronic systems – the same type of automated tools that IT departments use to monitor networks and systems, and to automatically patch and update them to keep soware and devices feature-current and cyber-secure. Most electronic security system deployments today are not cyber-se- cure or well-documented; in fact, those that are cyber-secure have mostly been secured by the customer's own IT departments. "Being an MSP means adding value, and the opportunity to deliver that is far broader than ever before," explains Brad McMullen, Stanley Security's VP of Marketing and Product Solutions. "IP-based physical security has natu- rally led to customers wanting service assurance, cyber-hygiene, remote management and other data-driven services for their infrastructure." e value of documentation: e first step to providing these data- driven services is documentation. Managed service providers always doc- ument their systems because it saves time, prevents mistakes and enables them to respond quickly to customer questions. Documentation also keeps them prepared so that as new product versions and technologies arrive, they can quickly scan the information about customer systems to identify prospects where they can now add more value. System Surveyor – a design and documentation tool that helps simplify security system manage- ment and reduce design time (learn more at www.securityinfowatch. com/12172305) – provides the type of documentation that customers value. Managed system providers must rely on such tools to make their work more efficient and effective. More than a decade ago, IT learned that the reactive approach of waiting for user service calls is not feasible for maintaining high system uptimes or as the primary means of diagnosing computer and network problems. Dig- ital automation – continuous system monitoring and automatic report- ing – is the only way to stay on top of things. Status detection and reporting, and problem alerting can be instant or nearly so. Another important factor is that automation scales well, whereas human labor does not. e value of information: As pro- fessionals in the IT and compliance audit departments of large organiza- tions know, auditing physical secu- rity system deployments has been a notoriously labor-intense process, especially compared to the ease of auditing IT systems. Viakoo is attempting to make that process easier for security, using machine learning and other advanced algorithms in a soware solution that automatically verifies and reports on the performance and integrity of phys- ical security systems, with alerts for service issues and a ticketing system for managing them. Cover Story Our business has changed more in the last five years than in the previous 50...Some customers are very focused on knowing their systems are always working as they should; some need to ensure their security is compliant to industry standards; some want more remote management capabilities. These are all best done 'as a service.'" — Gina Stuelke, Kenton Brothers Systems for Security Integrators must find a way to actually add value to the services they provide in order to get the Recurring Monthly Revenue. If you just sell the service contract and don't add value beyond that, you aren't in the Managed Services business." — Brad McMullen, Stanley Security 38 Security Dealer & Integrator / www.SecurityInfoWatch.com February 2018