Steel army fights world crime

Press, 17 April 1979, Page 17

Steel army fights world crime

By

CHRIS MIDDLETON,

World Feature Services

With international crime and terrorism an ever-in-creasing threat, the world’s insurance companies are demanding far greater security measures from their clients. No longer are tall fences and an Alsatian dog enough for a firm to claim good security: nowadays computerised patrols and mechanised doors are the criteria by which security is assessed.

And to keep up with the increasing need for tighter protection of people and property, the international security business has had to make rapid strides recently. In fact, in the last four years it has become one of the biggest growth industries in the world.

Proof of this will be on han “ at this year’s seventh biennial “Europrotection' conference in Paris from September 18 to 21. Although open only to the security trade, the confer-

ence is expected to attract some 30,000 delegates from 50 different countries — nearly twice the number that came in 1975. On display will be an intimidating array of security devices, designed to protect people from danger they may not even know they are in. Bulletproof vests, bullet-proof screens, fire-proof garbage cans, and oxygen masks that pop out of walls are just some of the simpler items that will be on show.

But there will also be a far more awesome array of hardware that represents the increasing mechanised and technological trend which international security has been forced to follow. The human factor has virtually disappeared from security, the bleary eyes of the nightwatchman replaced by the single infallible eye erf the X-ray or camera. One of the most spectacular examples of this technological revolution is a system at present used by a Netherlands-based firm. Under their computerised monitoring system, they can be alerted to break-ins that happen a thousand kilometres away.

If a burglar crosses an invisible beam in a Marseilles bank, fetr example, this will activate the central computer in Paris and give precise print-out information as to the identity of the bank and the exact location of the broken beam. The firm then immediately contacts a Marseilles-based security team, which will investigate the break-in.

The system not only saves work for the police, but it is also, according to the firm, more prompt and efficient. Indeed, many security firms claim it is public disillusionment with police capability that has been responsible for the growth in the security industry.

In many world capitals now, there are several security firms who erffer their own private prevention and detection services in competition with the local police. Nevertheless, the prime aim of the security industry is still to eliminate the need for detection bv preventing the initial crime. Conventional door locks are now well out of date, replaced by electromagnetic sheets of metal with 1500 kilogrammes of locking force behind them. Access to these can only be <rf>tained either by pressing the correct code numbers on a digital panel outside or by feeding a

special plastic card into a computer; if the number dialled is correct or the plastic card bears the approved code, the computer will unlock the door, at the same time supplementing the human doorman by making an exact note of the time of entry and identity of the entrant. But it is not just property which needs protection. Information, too, is now just as valuable, especially in international industry, and this has seen the emergence of the “voice security” trade. These firms offer their clients a service which ensures the safe transmission of secret information such as oil drilling results, multi-million pound funds transfers, and staff records and dossiers. Some merely ensure that phones are not "bugged” — like the firm in Argenteuil, France, which specialises in microphone detection — while others have their own exclusive “scrambled” radio link, over which they can transmit top-secret coded information.

Even at a less highpowered level, '‘securityconsciousness” is on the increase, with a growing number of security firms offering a "staff-screen-ing” service — such as checking on someone's past before emplttying him.

It is, of course, an expensive business; having someone “screened” can cost $lOO or more; having a set of computerised magnetic doors installed costs several thousands.