mall attack

Last week, I traveled down to Orlando, Fla. for a preview of the ASIS International conference in September. We took some incredible tours including a behind-the-scenes look at Kennedy Space Center, just days before the second-to-last shuttle launch (see story here), Daytona International Speedway (story here), and the upscale Mall at Millenia (story here). We also had the opportunity to participate in some military simulation training programs with Cubic Defense Applications, which resulted in one of the best adrenaline rushes I've had in a while. They let us "drive" hummers through simulated streets of Afghanistan (it felt so real I got a little motion sick) and shoot "real" weapons (equipped with lasers) while running down an abandoned alley. When I "died" I'm pretty sure my heart stopped beating and I will forever have the image of that guy pointing a gun at me appearing out of nowhere. It was a pretty awesome day, especially since we ended it with a quick stop at the Harry Potter theme park ride at Universal. It is Orlando after all.

As you might be aware, Orlando is an epicenter of tourism. We sat down with some folks from Visit Orlando who told us that the region has 50 million visitors a year, who spend $30 billion. And it's not just people here to see Mickey, either. Orlando has the second largest convention center after Las Vegas.

One of the most interesting discussions was some of the unique challenges that such a high-tourist area presents to law enforcement. Orlando Police Department has a special unit dedicated to tourist-related issues, aptly called Tourist Oriented Policing or TOPS. I wrote about the challenges of a similar department in Anaheim, Calif. for the ASIS seminar in 2009, which focused on how police deal with the constant influx of people to the area.

Corporal Marcus Camacho with the Orange County Sheriff's Office emphasized how crime can impact not only the experience of that person, but it can also have widespread economic impacts on the area. For example, if someone gets their wallet stolen they probably won't come back any time soon, but they'll probably tell their friends and family about that experience and perhaps dissuade those people from visiting the area.

The TOPS department also focuses on being a liaison between private businesses and the police department. They host an online briefing board with information on crimes and suspects as well as ongoing scams. As I said earlier, there are some unique issues in being a tourist town. The police deal with theme-park ticket scams, for example, which would be expected. But one of the most unique scams involves bogus pizza fliers. These scam artists will enter hotels and put pizza fliers under guest doors. If someone orders a pizza they will often try to get a credit card number over the phone. Or, even worse (I think), is when these scammers will actually deliver pizzas that were made in a car or nearby area that are unsanitary and frankly, just gross. Then, of course, guests aren't happy and call the hotel guest services, who in no way promote or allow these fliers to be distributed. It sounds sort of trivial, but it was surprising how many people referred to the pizza flier scam during our visit.

Hotels and law enforcement have also been dealing with a rash of pranksters who call hotel guests and convince them to do the most outrageous tasks, including trashing their rooms. This article in the Orlando Sentinel highlights a ridiculous scenario:

A woman in a hotel took a call from the person who claimed to be a front-desk clerk about a gas leak in their hotel room near Orlando International Airport. She frantically relayed the information to her husband, who was a deputy, mind you. He followed the caller's instructions . . . and smashed the window of his room with a toilet tank.

And he kept following the guy's instructions:
Break the mirror on the wall. Check.
Use the lamp to bash in the wall to get to the trapped man on the other side. OK.
Throw the mattress out the window and jump for safety. Out the mattress went.

And the caller hung up. Guess what? It wasn't someone from the front desk and when a hotel employee showed up, they informed the couple that there wasn't a gas leak. But the room was destroyed. These are the types of issues police are dealing with and a big part of their job has been to educate businesses and tourists about such scams. It sounds ridiculous and outrageous, but such scams have a huge impact on tourist areas.

My advice to you during the ASIS International Seminar on Sept. 19-22 is not to order pizza from your room and don't break any windows, even if someone tells you to.

For every municipal story I've written in the last year, I've heard the same thing, over and over: Budgets are being slashed. And it's only getting worse. But those same stories involve municipal security folks spending money on security, right? It's true, there are plenty of case studies out there about the deployment of wireless video surveillance systems or an improvement to communication networks, but many of those projects are funded through federal grants. The government has spent money on security since 9/11, but will that money start to dry up soon?

Yesterday, I spoke with the panelists for an upcoming presentation at TechSec Solutions called "Look Ma, No Wires." This presentation will focus on wireless technology and address issues including when to implement a wireless solution and what type of solution works best for certain deployments. But something that caught my ear as I was listening to Ralph Bell from Motorola was in regards to the work they do with municipalities. Basically, he reiterated that municipalities often have the money needed for an initial deployment, but don't have the financial resources or in-house expertise to maintain the infrastructure or pay for upgrades to the system. It's my understanding municipalities often receive federal grants, which are often designated for initial deployments, but rarely can be used for maintenance or repairs and the municipality must pay for that from its own funds.

And budget woes aren't going away any time soon. I just read an interesting Q&A article with the mayor of Newark, N.J., Cory Booker, about his approach to budgeting. Here's the link from the Huffington Post. Like many elected officials, he understood the importance of police, fire and other public safety agencies. As a matter of fact, here's his original approach to budget cutting:

"Squeeze everything else but police and fire."

But, according to the article, last year, the city laid off 164 officers, about 13 percent of the force. The reporter asked how it came to that. Here's his answer:

Look, budgets across the country -- 60 percent of American cities have had reductions in their forces of public safety. And, so, this is not something that's unique to Newark...So, we have dramatic losses in revenue. And public safety, frankly -- police and fire -- make up the significant majority of our budget. We were squeezing and starving every other area of our city. Furloughing employees, cutting staff. But it came to a point where we couldn't cut enough to make up for the tremendous budgetary shortfall.

He goes on to address having to put older police officers back out on the streets in order to maintain the same police presence before the cuts, but also notes that such budgetary restrictions have impacted the reduction in crime in the city. Of course, he also spins it as actually putting more experienced officers back out on city streets - he's a politician after all.

What do you think? How worried are you about the correlation between budgetary cuts and public safety? Are we over the worst of it or is the worst yet to come?

I spend a good amount of time writing about video surveillance and its use to prevent, but more often prosecute crimes. And while there has been significant advancements in this technology, from video analytics to reduction in cost which makes it more accessible to smaller businesses and the growing residential market, it's the same basic premise, really.

So when I read this article on AOL News, I couldn't help but wonder if the Brits were onto something. This article notes a growing trend for retailers and banks across the U.K., Europe and New Zealand to deploy a gadget called SelectaDNA Spray. Here are some details:

SelectaDNA Spray is a canister loaded with a harmless solution containing synthetic DNA. If a criminal attempts to burgle a premises fitted with the device, an employee can hit a panic button that alerts police to a crime in progress and simultaneously shoots out a fine mist covering everyone in the room, including the robber. And as each batch of the spray -- which glows blue under ultraviolet light -- has a unique DNA signature, police can connect the robber to the scene of the crime.

And here's another interesting tid bit: Almost everyone arrested in the U.K. is scanned with a UV light, no matter what crime the person is suspected of. Didn't know. Is that a common practice here in the U.S.?

But, like a lot of security technologies, the spray isn't only intended to capture criminals, but also to deter them from committing a crime. "Retailers are investing in this technology because they want to move the crime on somewhere else," said Andrew Knights, managing director of SelectaDNA. "They are just out to protect their property and staff." That's why every business that uses a SelectaDNA spray also prominently displays a bright yellow sign in their window showing a stick man with a bag of swag being hit by the mist. "Warning," the sign reads. "SelectaDNA spray installed here."

This article mentions a high usage of this product by retailers, but I have some doubts. If I were a retailer, I would be immediately concerned about installing anything that has potential to spray stuff on my merchandise. It could be hard to sell clothes that glow under ultraviolet light, unless of course your target audience are clubgoers - they may actually dig that.

But what do you think about such a product? Legit or fad? Wanna take bets on whether it will enter the U.S. market or not?

There were riots in the streets of Oakland, Calif. last night following an involuntary manslaughter conviction of a white Bay Area Rapid Transit police officer for shooting a 22-year-old unarmed black man on January 1, 2009.

That sentence carries a maximum four-year sentence.

But some in Oakland expected a tougher penalty for the former police officer, and took to the streets in protest, reported CNN.

Oakland Police Chief Anthony Batts said the high point of the protests there were about 800 people in the streets, which lead to the arrests of 50 people.

The shooting was captured on a bystander's cell-phone video camera:

At his trial, the officer claimed that he intended to draw and fire his Taser rather than his gun. But I wonder: How does a legally sworn officer make that kind of mistake? I'm not an expert on guns or Tasers, but it's my understanding that they're held and fired quite differently. It's apparent from the video that this situation was getting out of hand and there was a lot of chaos, so maybe the officer just lost his head? But I wonder too if this is any indication that these officers aren't properly trained?

Especially after watching the video, it seems like inexperience and chaos likely contributed to this outcome. There's a moment in the video, right after the shot is heard (around the 1:25 mark), when the officers seem completely stunned, especially the officer with the gun. It seems like they don't know what to do with the body or how they should deal with the situation.

Of course, it's still murder, regardless of whether he meant to do it or not. The officer will be sentenced August 6, and it'll be interesting to see how many years he gets and what the public's reaction will be.

Profiling: it's a word most people avoid, especially when it comes to law enforcement and security. When I was writing a series of articles about behavior profiling (referring to the way it is used by the Israeli's to detect suspect persons in airports), those I interviewed largely avoided using the word 'profiling' because of its association with racial discrimination.

Maybe that's why this article from USA Today caught my eye. It's all about efforts being made to understand and eliminate persistent racial profiling by police. And the kicker is, police seem to be welcoming the scrutiny.

In order to identify how officers react in situations that involve minorities, they are conducting a series of research on the subject.

Researchers are examining virtually all facets of police behavior, from officers' interactions with new immigrants to car stops and the use of lethal force.

The kinda cool part is that they're using video simulation to virtually place officers in these situations that involve minority 'suspects' to test their judgment and reaction. Researchers are then comparing those results to situations that do not involve minority suspects.

And apparently people are lauding the police for coming face-to-face with this issue.

"Law enforcement's willingness to confront issues of race represents a huge shift in modern policing," says Chuck Wexler, executive director of the Police Executive Research Forum, a law enforcement think tank. "I think you would be hard-pressed to find another institution in America more challenged by race than police. Coming out of the civil rights era, most departments were viewed (by minority communities) as occupying armies."

Kind of an interesting way to approach improving police performance, I thought.