Cards, Cloud, Compliance Lead Access Control Advances
Find out what’s going on in the realm of managed/hosted cloud-based alternatives, HSPD-12/FIPS-201 federal government compliance and near-field communications.
Ponder for a moment the tools and services available today for protecting a facility, and it becomes apparent access control has evolved into one of the security industry’s most vital disciplines.
Technological and system integration advances, leveraging the cloud to innovate new business efficiencies, adopting government standards in commercial markets, and tapping the possibilities of wireless infrastructures … these capabilities, among others, are becoming more attractive as cost-conscious campus users strive to meet their security requirements and organizational demands.
Here are several leading innovators in the market who will explain the current access control landscape and what’s just over the horizon.
Web-Based Services Aplenty
There are several converging factors drawing enterprise protection professionals to physical access control “as a service.” Campuses are demanding greater pricing and scaling flexibility beyond what traditional legacy access control models can deliver due to budget constraints, says Bill Moran, vice president of sales for Sterling, Va.-based RedCloud, a provider of Web-based, physical access control systems. Organizations are increasingly unwilling to invest significantly in expensive servers and IT infrastructure up front, and then get saddled with recurring costs associated with managing this IT infrastructure.
Cloud-based access control as a hosted or managed service offers several key benefits to the integrator as follow:
More flexibility and options. The managed service model provides a greater degree of flexibility so that, if the campus chooses, the integrator can host all of the servers and equipment.
By doing so, campuses are not required to make up-front capital outlays to stand-up servers at their facilities. Conversely, if a campus wants to manage the IT infrastructure itself and maintain their own facility access privileges, this hosted option, and others, can be easily delivered.
Web-based access control enables security and facility managers to interact with and manage employee and visitor access privileges quickly and easily from any location without being tied to a dedicated client workstation or paying for software licenses per user. With a browser-based Web application, campuses can securely manage access privileges from a broad range of devices (smartphones, tablets, laptops) and from any location.
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