7 Ways Visitor Management Answers Physical Security Challenges
A company's front lobby is its first impression and a critical security checkpoint. Yet, many organizations still rely on outdated, inefficient visitor management systems. From pen-and-paper logbooks to rudimentary digital solutions, security gaps and operational bottlenecks persist. It's time to elevate your visitor experience and bolster your organization's defenses with a comprehensive, integrated visitor management solution.
1. Granting Visitor Access Without Prior Vetting or Background Checks
Employees are known identities within an organization, and it is likely that they pass through several checks and approvals before they are hired and granted access to certain building areas. But what about visitors, who are unknown and pose risk? If your visitor management strategy is too basic to include the necessary vetting and background checks for these individuals, your security is compromised.
HID’s visitor management solutions can check a pre-registered or walk-in visitor’s information against national and local watchlists, sex offender registries and in-house databases. These checks can also be configured to trigger additional workflows, such as automatically sending email requests to the appropriate personnel or departments for approval or denying the visit if a visitor’s ID matches a high-risk individuals watchlist.
2. Issuing “All-Access” Visitor Badges With No Restrictions
Front lobbies can be stressful environments. In an effort to alleviate this situation, organizations often issue “all-access” visitor passes with no restrictions. This is likely done for ease of processes and time or because organizations don’t have a solution advanced enough to easily grant specific access or simply issue name stickers.
A visitor management solution integrated with your organization’s access control system means you can grant access to specific building areas and avoid handing out unrestricted badges, which pose a big security risk if kept or lost by the visitor. You can also utilize mobile QR codes or electronic ID cards if you prefer, which can be sent to visitors via email and scanned on turnstiles throughout their visit.
3. Little Transparency of Visitor Actions and Insight Into Security Threats
Limited knowledge of visitor data outside of a logbook or spreadsheet results in a lack of security intelligence, introducing undetected risks. Furthermore, the alternative processes to identify these risks become siloed rather than standardized across an organization.
It’s often thought that having an insight into visitor data beyond check-in date and time is only achievable with complicated and expensive technologies that are only realistic for large-scale organizations. The truth is that collecting usable and impactful visitor data is an achievable reality for all organizations given the range of solutions available — from affordable, easy-to-deploy solutions such as EasyLobby to highly scalable and specialized solutions like HID Visitor Manager or HID SAFE™ Visitor Manager.
4. Cumbersome Auditing, Reporting and Compliance
For many organizations, preparing access reports for both regulatory or ad-hoc purposes is a huge and daunting task. This only hinders physical security further since it involves lengthy manual processes which are prone to human error and inaccuracies. If audits or general reporting are not carried out, potential risks and unusual patterns can go unnoticed.
With HID’s visitor management solutions, organizations can maintain audit trails in addition to continuous, intelligent reporting for easy auditing and access to reports based on time, location and other factors. In the case of an emergency, receptionists can alert all checked-in visitors with instructions and retrieve a report listing all onsite visitors in a matter of seconds, ensuring that everyone gets evacuated.
5. Lack of Data Security
Using pen and paper logbooks increases the chances of forgery and data breaches, since all data (or lack thereof) is visible for everyone to see. A visitor management solution that digitally captures and stores data, on the other hand, allows that data to be retrieved from anywhere, at any time — a critical requirement during an audit or emergency. It grants your visitor logs the security intelligence to function at an enterprise level.
6. Manual Processes Prone to Human Error
Countless manual processes inevitably increase the likelihood of mistakes. But when receptionists or security staff are faced with other tasks that need their immediate attention — like dealing with visitors — the risk increases, and administration tasks often remain unfinished or incorrectly executed. These human errors compromise an organization’s first line of defense.
For this reason, automation is key. Deploying a visitor management solution automates and simplifies pre-registration, screening, alerts, ID checks, approval workflows and more. Not only does this reduce manual effort, repetition and errors, but it augments an organization’s emergency response strategy.
7. Lack of Integration Between Internal Business Systems and the Digital Lobby
Security is compromised when there is no connectivity between security systems and other systems in your organization. For a fluid approach that provides complete coverage, utilize your front lobby as an extension of your business and security strategy. HID’s visitor management solutions integrate seamlessly with various data sources — such as PACS, directories, HR, IT databases, physical security departments, calendaring applications, external lists and more — to create a physically and digitally unified approach to security.
Nitin Parihar brings over 12 years of experience in the identity and access management spaces. For the last six years, Nitin has provided product management and product marketing leadership for HID Visitor Manager and PIAM products. Prior to joining HID, he led a team managing IAM products at Thomson Reuters. He is based in Fremont, CA.