As security professionals, we tend to get seduced by the beauty of our technology. We go to trade exhibitions filled with the latest innovations and marvel at what we see without understanding how it fits in with what we do. It-s both overwhelming and distracting, like trying to learn to cook by walking through a grocery store.
This focus on technology teaches us to judge the effectiveness of physical protection systems by the strength of the barriers, the acuity of the cameras, and the sensitivity of the sensors. Terrorists and criminals look for something else entirely, though: where we see strength, they find weakness and vulnerability. We are looking at the same things, but not seeing the same things. If we want to stop them, we need to know more than how they work. We need to learn to see the way they see.
A physical protection system - that collection of people, sensors, barriers, policies, and technology - is a lot like a piano: and you cannot
