One of the most common mistakes made by homeowners is the belief that installing a security system (e.g. an alarm) makes them impervious to threats such as a break-in. Security products are designed to achieve a range of objectives: deter potential intruders, alert you of a breach, record an event, buy you time by slowing down an intruder, etc. But no security system, be it a door, alarm, camera, or moat is impenetrable. Security can always be defeated.
 
The objective of a comprehensive security system is to buy you enough time for the police to respond or to retrieve a weapon before coming directly into harms way. Again, it’s a function of time. Whether you live in Fort Knox or a trailer, if a determined intruder has the right combination of tools, skills, and time, they will get in.
 
The Alarm System Fallacy
American families disproportionately rely on alarms for security, with approximately 15% of homes having one. Alarms serve two purposes: deterring some opportunistic burglars and alerting you to an intruder. Homes without an alarm are 300% more likely to be broken into than a home that has one. Alarms will deter some opportunistic intruders in search of a soft target, but it will not deter all opportunistic intruders and it will not deter a determined intruder who has done their research and is well prepared.
           
The second purpose of an alarm system is to alert you of a breach. This is an important function that allows you, your alarm company, and the police to respond more quickly than if you didn’t have an alarm. However, police response times vary significantly. The average nationwide response time for burglaries “in progress,” that have been verified by a 911 call, is 7 minutes. The average response time for unverified alarms is 30 minutes.
 
Most break-ins occur in less than 60 seconds.
 
An alarm isn’t going to stop a burglar from breaking into your home. It buys you a few seconds by alerting you as soon as their is a breach and it will deter some opportunistic burglars from trying. But by the time your alarm goes off, someone is already inside your home and chances are they will be gone long before the police show up.
​
CCTV and Surveillance Systems
Like alarms, the function of camera systems is often misunderstood. In residential settings, cameras are usually installed to record an event. They also have a deterrent effect, like alarms, because a potential burglar who notices cameras is less likely to target the home because they are more likely to get caught when the police have video evidence. At the same time, wearing a mask or balaclava easily negates it’s ability to identify an intruder, and a home with a camera might be seen as having something worth stealing.
 
Tim Wenzel of Facebook succinctly addressed the role of cameras in a recent article. He wrote:
          “Cameras provide security.” No, they do not. Cameras are an investigative tool. 
           If you require them as a security tool, someone will need to be watching them."
 
Cameras will deter some opportunistic burglars and should help in identifying and prosecuting those responsible. But on it’s own, a camera is not going to stop a determined intruder from breaking in to your home and unless it's monitored, it doesn't buy you any time to react. It’s not going to keep you safe.
 
Alarms and cameras are important parts of a comprehensive security system that includes physical forced entry barriers such as reinforced doors and windows. On their own they have a deterrent effect, will alert you of a breach, and record the event, but will not prevent a determined intruder from gaining access. The core function of alarms and (unmonitored) cameras only kick in once an intruder is already in your home.
 
A comprehensive security system must include barriers that prevent forced entry, slow an intruder down, and buy you time to assess the situation, call the police, and/or retrieve a weapon. Even if high security doors are not in the budget, there are inexpensive, off-the-shelf products that will make your doors and windows more secure.

One of the most frequent challenges we deal with is “right-sizing” security: matching our security recommendations with a client’s needs. To do so, we have to overcome misconceptions and the “Hollywood” effect, which usually lead clients to seek a much higher level of security than they need.
 
We discuss their specific threat scenario and risks, educate them on the range of available security options, and propose options that actually address those risks.
 
New clients often request unnecessary (and expensive) security features that—considering their threat scenario—they simply don’t need. People have been conditioned by Hollywood and news media to associate things like bullet and blast resistance with security. However, those solutions tend to exceed client needs and overlook the far more common and realistic security risk we all face: forced entry and opportunistic crime.
 
The percentage of calls we receive for bullet-resistant doors is a reflection of this conditioning. Most of our clients, including millionaires and billionaires, are exponentially more likely to be robbed by an opportunistic criminal because they live in an exclusive neighborhood than be the subject of a credible death threat.
 
Another one of our favorite right-sizing examples is the RPG scenario:

• Client: “Can your doors stop an RPG?”
• Shield representative: “What’s the likelihood of someone shooting an RPG at your door?”
• Client: [After a brief pause] “Zero, I guess.”

​Very few people have a need for a blast-resistant door to stop an RPG, but they like the idea because that’s what they’ve seen in movies.
 
Education: Forced Entry
Educating clients to help right-size security starts with an overview of our various forced entry door and window levels: 5-minute (FE5) and 15-minute (FE15), as well as the US State Department standard to which our doors and windows are tested.
 
Many clients reject the FE5 option because, in their minds, 5 minutes seems insufficient. It’s only after watching test footage that they realize an FE5 rating makes it more secure than virtually every other residential door on the market (with the exception of our FE15 door).
 
The State Department FE5 test consists of a highly skilled two-man team attacking three (3) distinct locations on the door for five minutes each (15 mins total) with a selection of axes, sledge hammers, wedges, and pry bars.
 
The State Department FE15 test consists of a highly skilled six-man team attacking three (3) distinct locations on the door for fifteen minutes each (45 mins total) with an expanded selection of axes, sledge hammers, wedges, pry bars, and 120lbs battering ram.
 
An example we use to help educate clients is from the Arab Spring. In September 2011, the Israeli Embassy in Cairo was overrun by a mob of several hundred protestors. The six Israeli guards on-duty that night took refuge in the embassy’s safe haven as the mob ransacked the Embassy, until Egyptian security forces arrived to assist them. For several hours, all that stood between the Israeli guards and probable death was an FE15 door.
 
If that’s what the Israelis are using in Egypt, maybe it’s overkill for your front entry.
 
Education: Ballistics
We go through a similar process when discussing bullet resistance. We offer three options:

1. Handguns: UL level 3 (.44 magnum)
2. Rifles: UL level 8 (7.62x51)
3. Ceramic self-healing: capable of withstanding hundreds of level 8 rounds (watch here)

Most of our clients whose threat scenarios do call for ballistic resistance would be adequately served at the handgun level, but that doesn’t curtail their interest in the rifle level or self-healing system. It’s easy to appeal to someone’s vanity in these situations and up-sell them. But both the rifle level and self-healing system are more expensive, add weight to the door, and are less comfortable to operate – none of which are advantages. The bottom line is that you should not up-sell security features that are not needed.
 
Professional Responsibility
Right-sizing security to meet a client’s needs is a process that often leads to a smaller sale; however, it is the responsible and ethical course of action. Not only does it help build a relationship of trust with clients, but right-sizing should be a pillar of our code of ethics as security professionals.

Security threats come in all shapes and sizes, and Shield Security Doors are designed with that in mind. It’s important to understand the function of security doors: they buy you time. The idea of an “impenetrable door” is nothing more than a myth. Every door can be defeated, from Fort Knox to the White House bunker to your linen closet. All it takes is time, tools, and skill.

That’s also why security ratings for doors such as the US State Department forced entry standard and Underwriters Laboratory (UL) fire ratings are measured against time. The State Department forced entry standard has three levels: 5 minute, 15 minute, and 60 minute. UL fire ratings range from 20 minutes to 3 hours.

Here are some of the threats that our doors protect against:

• Burglar proof
• Bullet proof (bullet resistant)
• Kick proof (prevent door kick-in)
• Pry proof
• Fire proof
• Weather proof (thermally insulated)

Our goal at Shield is to provide a product that is reliable, versatile, and discrete. For this reason, each door is custom-made to meet the aesthetic and security needs of its environment. The combinations of designs and security features are virtually limitless. If you can think of it, we can build it.
​
Such a variety of options means that Shield doors and windows can be used just about anywhere. They are equally suited for an embassy in a high-threat country as they are for high-end real estate project in Manhattan. No two projects are alike, so no two doors are alike.

• Gun room
• Safe room (aka panic room)
• Front entrance door
• Bedroom door
• Garage door
• Mudroom door
• Closet door
• Office door
• Apartment door
• A/V room door
• Guard house door
• Store front door

If you don’t care about aesthetics, securing your home is easy. You could put up a ten-foot chain link fence, top it with rows of barbed wire, steel bars on your windows, and replace your front door with an industrial steel door. That will pretty much guarantee your home is well defended from intruders. It will also guarantee that you have the most visually unappealing home on your street and create several other problems:

• Hurts the resale value
• Unpleasant to live with
• Might be prohibited by your town building code
• It’s just strange for a residential neighborhood

In order to be forced entry and ballistic resistant (FE/BR) certified, doors have to pass a grueling series of tests performed to the US State Department Forced Entry standard, SD-STD-01.01 Rev. G. This is the testing performed on doors installed in US embassies around the world, as well as other important government offices and facilities. There are three forced entry levels: five minute, fifteen minute, and sixty minute.

The Shield Embassy Series door is rated to the five (5) minute level and consists of 0.5 man-hours of attack time while the Shield Fortress Series is rated to the fifteen minute (15) level and consists of 4.5 man-hours of attack time. The State Department standard also holds an equivalency to the ASTM F3038 - 14 standard, so Shield doors also meet ASTM F30308. 

Forced entry tests involve a team of attackers trying to breach the door by exploiting weak points in the allotted amount of time. A five minute test consists of a five minute attack on the lock side of the door, five minutes in the center of the door, and five minutes on the hinge side of the door. Naturally, the fifteen minute test consists of fifteen minutes spent on each attack point.

A recent article by Fortune.com covered the security risks of using IP-based and other online security systems. Last month, hackers infiltrated the smart locks used by the Seehotel Jägerwirt hotel in Austria. The hackers locked guests out of their rooms and disabled the hotel admins from using the system. This attack came at the peak of the skiing season and the hotel was fully booked. The hackers demanded a ransom to be paid in 1500 Euros worth of Bitcoin before eventually giving up control of the smart locks.
​
This wasn’t the first time this hotel has been compromised, and it likely won’t be the last, even if they change to a different smart lock. A Techcrunch.com article covering the Def Con hacking conference found that approximately 75% of smart locks have poor cyber security measures and are easily defeated. Thanks to Austrian fire codes, none of the guests were locked into their rooms or the hotel; the fire code mandated manual locks as backups in case of such an event. Despite the fact that nobody was in harm’s way this time, the danger is still incredibly real. In this instance, guests were locked out, separated from their belongings. This is a huge inconvenience and a financial issue for the hotel, but nobody was hurt. They very easily could have been.

The hackers had total control over the system that supported these locks. Suppose the hackers wanted to gain entry to the rooms instead of prevent it. It’s the same principal in terms of the security flaws. A hacker could disable every lock in the hotel while someone else entered the rooms as the guests slept. This scenario is far more deadly than a small ransom to let the guests back into their rooms.

We often get questions from our clients about controlling their doors with an app and the answer is always the same: no. We consider the risks of internet-based security/access control systems to be unacceptably high, which is why none of our door or locks are online. Anything connected to the internet can be hacked with relative ease, especially compared to what it would take to physically defeat our doors.

The IP connected security system used by Seehotel Jägerwirt wound up being such a hassle that the hotel will be returning to traditional locks on all their doors. Their experience with smart locks has been a costly mistake and valuable lesson that smart locks are not necessarily safe locks. 

Several of our previous posts have referenced “ballistic resistace” (or bullet resistance) as a key feature of high security doors. Without seeing it in action, it might be hard to picture how this works.

We’ve all seen ballistic resistant glass in movies or on tv. The bad guys open fire and their shots are stopped by a pane of glass, now covered in spider web cracks. We use a much less dramatic, but equally impressive technology behind our doors.
​
On our UL level 8 (rifle) rated door, we sometimes utilize a “self-healing” system. The door is filled with ceramic pellets designed to absorb the impact of a round. As the round pierces the paneling or skin of the door, they crush the pellets behind it. Their energy is totally absorbed and the round won’t go any further. 

The aspect that is “self-healing” is that once those pellets get crushed, the pellets above begin to trickle down and fill in any gaps. The door acts almost like the hopper on a pitching machine, with pellets falling from top to bottom to replace those destroyed by bullet rounds. This is how the doors can withstand so many rounds in the same location without penetration.

This is a major advantage compared to ballistic glass or steel, which lack the self-healing properties of ceramics and therefore have a much lower failure threshold than ceramics.