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Safety & Security Blog
The latest in employee safety, duress alarms, and lone worker security.
Security analytics leverage principles of big data to improve security — both physical security and network security.
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In light of recent concerns about foreign surveillance cameras entering government buildings, CIOs would be wise to do the necessary research when purchasing physical security products.
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The 2019 Lone Worker Safety Conference highlighted the importance of empowering lone workers to put their safety first.
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NJ S.2986 becomes effective on January 1st, 2020, which means hotels need to start installing duress alarms today. Here’s what you need to know:
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An incident involving an armed man outside of a New Jersey elementary school underscores the need for legislators to implement the proper security measures to protect students from gun violence.
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Lone workers face more risk in the workplace than traditional office employees. Dynamic risk assessment can help these workers stay protected from the unexpected.
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These are the four most common risks that lone workers face. What can employers do to mitigate the dangers?
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Stay on top of the latest advancements in school security technology.
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As innovative workplace strategies allow fewer employees to handle greater responsibilities, employers have a responsibility to protect their workers efficiently and affordably.
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Smart surveillance is cheaper than ever, but is your network ready for the latest security tech?
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Protecting American schools calls for the most effective and advanced security systems on the market. Understanding which technologies are currently available, and which are on the horizon can help school security professionals plan effectively.
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In high-risk work environments, duress alarms give employees a much-needed lifeline in the event of an emergency.
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The growing threat of mass shootings highlights the need for better security measures.
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AI-powered cameras are becoming increasingly popular in the consumer sphere. Here’s why enterprises should pay attention.
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June’s mass shooting at the Capital Gazette office in Annapolis, Maryland, has many traditional workplaces looking to enterprise security systems to keep their employees safe from unexpected danger.
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Professionals in a wide variety of fields often find themselves alone in hazardous work conditions. Are you doing all that you can to keep your lone workers safe?
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Courthouses can be dangerous places for judicial officials, which is why stronger security systems are desperately needed.
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As active shooter scenarios attract an increasing amount of media attention, schools across the nation are investing in stronger, more reliable security measures.
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Workers in a wide variety of fields are asking their employers to bolster workplace safety measures, and with good reason.
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While enterprise-scale options are still a few years away, early consumer-oriented cameras powered by AI demonstrate the technology’s immense potential in the field of security.
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Laboratory environments are generally staffed with highly knowledgeable and competent staff. But even the best of the best have accidents from time to time. There are some simple steps to take to prevent as many accidents as possible, but a great safety plan always has a contingency system in place for those times when something does go awry.
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According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, there are about three million non-fatal workplace injuries and illnesses reported every year. That equates to about 3.2 cases for every 100 full-time employees, many of which occur in manufacturing settings where the climate is just right for slip and fall accidents, back injuries, head and other injuries sustained from falling objects, and other such hazards.
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While parents are prepping for back-to-school sticker shock and students are worried about what they'll wear and if all their friends will be back, school administrators are focused on how they'll keep students and faculty safe and secure this school year. Meteorologists tell us to be prepared for El Nino, geologists warn we're overdue for earthquakes, and criminologists say that no school is 100 percent safe from rampages like we've witnessed at Sandy Hook, Muskegon Heights High School, Umpqua Community College, and tragically, so many others.
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As another school year rolls around, it's time to take stock of your emergency preparedness level. Sure, the biggies are always on our minds: fire, severe weather, and the potential for an active shooter scenario on campus. But most emergencies that strike schools aren't the headline news makers. They are everyday incidents that involve just a few people, but good response times and a strong preparedness plan can mean the difference in whether or not the event ends up being an amusing anecdote for the high school graduation ceremony or a serious event that alters people's lives. Here are some tips for emergency preparation success.
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The need for school security alarm systems is well documented. What's less discussed is exactly how school systems can go about selecting the right security alarm to meet their needs, their budget constraints, and the other functionality they desire. Here are the top considerations to make as you search for the ideal alarm to protect and empower your schools, faculty, staff, and student body.
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Whether you're managing a municipal building, a public venue, or a private school, there is one thing on everyone's minds: how to keep workers and visitors safe. It's on the news and all over social media what a dangerous world we live in. An active shooter here. A bomb threat there. A medical emergency at one place, and a dangerous chemical spill in another. What can you do? You can install an alarm system. Are you under the impression that they're too expensive, or hard to use, or perhaps not really essential to your operations? Here are the top myths surrounding alarm systems and what the truth really is.
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The same thing happens with our school security alarm systems. Every day, we see them in the offices and hallways, without ever really paying attention to them. Then, when those security systems are actually needed, nobody readily remembers exactly where they are or how to use them.
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It's a crazy world. We depend so much on things like cell service and wired systems, that when we are without them, we're lost. Every week there's a new headline on the news about some horror or tragedy that a business has to face -- bomb threats, medical emergencies no one was prepared for, women unexpectedly giving birth within minutes, workers getting trapped in odd situations. All of these and more can happen anywhere on any given workday, which is why wireless panic alarms are so vital for today's businesses. Here's what you need to know about these systems.
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Schools should be the safest places on the planet. Yet, during a one-month period, almost 6 percent of high school students stayed at home due to feeling unsafe either at school or during the commute to school. Principals and administrators have bullies, out of control parents, angry teens acting out, and other potential threats in the backs of their minds almost constantly. How can you keep your faculty, staff, and students blissfully safe in this age of worry and uncertainty?
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Warehouse work has always revolved around improving efficiencies, eliminating waste, and making the environment safer for workers. But today's 'smart warehouses' take these goals to an entirely new level. Gone are the lengthy printouts with customer orders -- hand-picked and recorded on sheets -- usually introducing errors into the process. All those errors add up. In the age of the 'Amazon effect', where customers are spoiled by super-accurate, always on-time, served-with-a-smile deliveries, every warehouse is forced to step up their game or be left behind in the dust. Enter: the Internet of Things (IoT).
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Schools today have a lot of options when it comes to security. Some choose a duress alarm system,while others opt for onsite security guards or depend on their phone system in the event of emergency. When it comes to facing the wide range of threats that today's schools are subject to, duress alarms clearly stand on top. These systems are quite a bit more affordable than paying for onsite security personnel, and are much more reliable than phone systems (even cellular ones). How can you choose the perfect alarm system for your school?
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Whether you run a hospital or a school, a detainment facility or a manufacturing facility,security is forefront on your mind these days. Random acts of violence, an uptick in the number of people suffering from scary medical issues, and growing concerns over legal liabilities all point to the need for more stringent security measures. When looking at the systems available, cost is a major factor, followed by reliability, usability, and convenience. Will a worker be able to depend on the system when someone is critically injured? Can it be disabled if someone decides to attack our facilities? Will it be easy enough to operate that workers can use it years after their training, even when panicking?
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OSHA has less to say about protecting lone workers than you might expect. However, the agency has a longstanding, well-established set of policies that dictate that employers should take reasonable precautions for safeguarding all workers. Most employers do so out of human decency, anyway, not because there is a law or rule somewhere stating that they have to. What are the best strategies for making sure that lone workers are protected on the job?
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CareerCast is all about jobs. They help people find jobs, and they like to rank jobs. They rank the best jobs of the year, the worst jobs of the year, and even how to get the good ones. CareerCast also produces an annual list of the most dangerous jobs, and for 2015, working with animals, firefighting, lumberjacking, and being a corrections officer topped the list. Why are corrections officers at such a high risk of accident or injury or illness? It goes beyond the fact that they deal with criminals all day every day, many of which are violent offenders. There is more to it.
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A duress alarm system is a critical safety feature for businesses, schools, and other organizations. Here’s how to select the right system for your unique needs.
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Worker safety is of paramount importance within the manufacturing industry. Good safety records keep OSHA and other government regulators from knocking, and help to reduce the growing costs of workers' compensation insurance. But on a personal level, no owner, manager, or supervisor wants their workers injured. These workers aren't just a financial investment, they are the heart and soul of the company. Here are several reasons why your manufacturing facility needs to add a duress alarm system to your safety plan as soon as possible.
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Today's threats are growing by the moment. A wireless society means that more workers are doing their jobs remotely, while incidents of violence and terrorism grow continually. It's challenging to keep up with who is where, what they're up to, and when a worker might be in danger. In response to these trends, duress alarm systems have been developed to help organizations keep track of workers, check on their well-being, and allow workers to summon help when needed. This is what duress alarms are and how they can protect your most valuable asset -- your people.
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A sizeable percentage of workers in today's society spend all or a lot of their time alone. Sales people, service professionals, security guards, medical personnel, clerks, and numerous other workers are often by themselves, in unfamiliar areas, around people they don't know, and potentially in the dark. When fall and winter set in, dark can come as early as 4PM. This means that a typical worker with an 8 to 5 job is leaving well past dark, and workers on second and third shifts might come to work and leave again, all in the dark. How can employers help keep workers safe when they're out in the dark?
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Lone workers are at a greater risk than those who are continually around others. These workers can become ill, injured, or worse, and might be stranded helpless for hours before they are missed or discovered. Companies need to have plans in place to monitor these workers and to empower them to get assistance if needed. Solutions like duress alarms are ideal for helping to keep lone workers safe and secure. Here are three different types of lone workers you need to identify in your company and put protective measures in place for.
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Nurses have tough jobs. They step in when most everyone else runs out. Nurses handle nasty things, frightened and irritable family members, demanding doctors, brutal schedules, and people who are sick or injured and aren't in the best of moods or conditions. Additionally, nurses are also often exposed to violence. Some hospitals have implemented policies for nurses to carry ordinary mobile devices, like smartphones or tablets, but these devices come with problems, as you'll soon see. The ideal solution is lone working devices like Guardian security alarms that nurses can use anywhere, anytime, in virtually any situation.
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Every day in the United States, an estimated 3.2 million teachers and more than 50 million students make their way to public and private schools. These figures don't even include all of the substitute teachers, administrators, helpers, bus drivers, and other staff it takes to run a full-time educational facility, nor do these numbers include the preschool, kindergarten, community school, and college campuses around the nation.
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Unfortunately threats to college campuses have become common place in the United States. Bullying, Suicide and Self-Injury, Teacher Attrition, and Active shooters are all problems that campuses are facing.
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A lone worker is someone who has jobs and assignments that require workers to be on their own for long periods of time. If a lone worker gets injured on the job is there anyone they can reach out to? If not, could you afford the costs associated with not properly protecting your workers safety and well-being? Probably not.
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While it's true that there is no law that prevents an employee from working alone, it's always important to understand as much about this type of situation as you can. From an employer's perspective, you are subject to certain rules and regulations that require you to create the safest possible environment for that employee at all times.
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A duress alarm system can work in a number of ways. The simplest setup is when the alarm is programmed to sound an alert when a worker pushes the button for assistance. However, in a lab setting, the worker can sometimes become incapacitated and unable to sound the alert. So, laboratories can also choose alarms that have a 'man down' feature, which sets off the alarm if the body of a lab worker becomes prostrate.
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As new policies and standards for lone workers begin to emerge it's important to get an idea of what rules you should be following before the new year. Some guidelines from the OSHA make it difficult to know the difference between what you should be doing and what you need to be doing.
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Facilities and campuses all over the world are looking for better ways to keep the people who work, learn, shop, and play on their grounds safe in this era of craziness. It seems as if the only thing that bumps one horrifying act from the news is when the next one happens. Often, that is a matter of days or hours, not the weeks and months and years that we used to go without hearing news of active shooters and other terrifying situations.
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For every 100,000 U.S. residents, 724 are in prison. This is the highest rate of incarceration in the entire world. While keeping these dangerous criminals off of the streets is essential for our national security, it is left to fewer than 500,000 people to see that more than two million prison and jail inmates are kept safe from each other and away from society.
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A decade ago, an active shooter on a school campus would have dominated the news for weeks on end. Most people in the nation would have known the story and likely been able to name details of the event. Today, it seems like the news of one school shooting merely blends into the other.
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Umpqua Community College, Sandy Hook Elementary School, Marysville-Pilchuck High School, Seattle Pacific University, Sparks Middle School. Most of us would never have heard of these small schools unless they had made headline news.
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Every school district occasionally deals with minor emergencies like severe weather, medical situations, and having to pass bad news along to faculty, staff, or students. Unfortunately, too many school systems must deal with serious situations like weather tragedies and active shooter situations.
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High definition security cameras are by far one of the most efficient, cost-effective ways to add an additional layer of security to nearly any environment.
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On average, there were 3.3 deaths per 100,000 full-time workers during 2013. This breaks down to 88 a week, or more than 12 every single day.
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Regardless of the type of business that you're running, employee safety should always be one of your highest priorities. In today's environment, danger can come from anywhere - it's important to have some type of mechanism in place to not only help alert workers to potentially threatening situation, but also to provide them with the actionable information that they can use to maintain the safest possible environment moving forward.
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In today's environment, wireless technology isn't just a way to make sure that you and your employees are connected to the Internet as quickly and as reliably as possible. While that is important, recent advancements have made it possible to take things so much further and extend the general benefits of wireless into the realm of employee protection.
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