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SERIES 1 | Hotel Security Systems | SALTO Access Control

Chris — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 22:00:41 +0000

The latest XS4 electronic stand alone locks, contact less update on card wall readers and SVN Virtual Network technology from SALTO Systems are aiding security at Malaysia’s top luxury resort complex, The Club at The Saujana.

Set among 160 acres of lush tropical gardens and nestled among the rolling hills of a palm plantation yet just a 35 minute drive from Kuala Lumpur airport, The Club at The Saujana is the latest addition to GHM Hotel’s worldwide portfolio of luxury hotels and resorts.

It takes its name from an old Malay expression meaning – as far as the eye can see – and The Club at The Saujana occupies two completely renovated and remodelled buildings. These consist of 105 low rise rooms and suites, adjoined to two championship golf courses.

Each is distinctively designed and luxuriously furnished in a contemporary Asian chic style with relaxing colour palettes and dark wood floors. Attention to detail is as you would expect and even includes an IPod dock in every room. Discrete but effective security is the order of the day. The owners and developers knew that fitting the latest contact less electronic access control technology could deliver significant operational benefits and advantages to the resort so this became an integral part of the re-development plan from day one.

So with a clear objective in mind, the system that has been specified, installed and commissioned by local SALTO distributor My Datacet, consists of a total of 111 XS4 stand alone wire free electronic locks and these are fitted to 105 guest rooms,4 butlers pantries, a F&B storeroom and an external garden gate. These are networked and interfaced via SALTO’s powerful SVN Virtual Network software and are joined by 2 strategically located contact less wall readers and a key card programmer.

Says Ivan Khong of My Datacet: “We were delighted to win such a prestigious contract. Although it did prove quite a complicated project due to very high standards of installation and finish required, we relished the challenge.

Access to doors around the resort is now controlled via logo printed Mifare smart cards for guests, and electronic key fobs for staff. These are allied to SALTO’s XS4 locks in a contemporary black finish which now control each door.

Each lock has its own battery power source and built-in card reader which identifies the user, whether it is a guest’s card or a staff member’s key fob, interrogates their access rights and then either opens the lock or refuses entry.

This provides The Club at The Saujana with the control they need yet gives them the flexibility to easily grow the system to meet their ongoing security requirements.” Tim Bilfinger, Manager of The Club at The Saujana agrees: “The security of our guests is paramount.

As part of the remodelling of the resort we were keen to move with the times and wanted to upgrade to something more state-of-the-art. While looking at ways of doing this we realised that a whole host of issues that had previously been of concern to us, such as the need for greater guest security and the monitoring of staff movement for example, could easily be addressed with the latest in wireless access control systems. We chose SALTO because their solution offered us all this and a great deal more. They also had a very proactive attitude towards all our various requests.”

David Rees, Asia Pacific Regional Manager for SALTO Systems comments: “Resort installations are normally based on flexible time limited access. In practice this means that guests usually stay for short periods of time after which their access authorisation is automatically withdrawn from the room lock and any further changes of the system require intervention at the lock with a “management card”. With the SALTO system this is controlled via our SALTO Virtual Network (SVN) utilising distributed intelligence in both the lock and the key card.

In practice this means the locks are networked to the resort computers, providing full control of the property yet they need no hard wiring or WIFI infrastructure. Both the key card which is contact less and the lock, use Read/Write technology for 2-way communication. This can not only open the guest’s room, but thanks to the built-in lock and on key audit trail facility, the resort can also easily check who accessed a room and when.”

Tim Bilfinger continues: “One of our main requirements was the flexibility to control the access and movement of guests and staff within the resort – not just through the bedroom doors. To achieve this we needed a modern, user friendly single system that was going to be compact enough to work on all the doors and still be reliable.

As you can imagine resort doors are opened many thousands of times over during the course of a year by housekeepers and guests alike, so reliability is of prime importance.

We chose SALTO because it enables us to offer a safe and user-friendly door locking system to our guests that guarantee both their privacy and security at the same

time. And now that it’s installed and in every day use, we’re finding two features of the system particularly useful.

This is the ability to track entries to individual rooms via the audit trail and the fact that there is no need to replace locks and keys if a guest loses their card or a staff member loses their key fob – we can delete it from the system simply and quickly.”

SERIES 1 – SECURING CRITICAL INFRASTRUCTURE FOR GOVERNMENT – SALTO Access Control Case Study

Chris — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 21:34:09 +0000

The French Health Products Safety Agency (Afssaps) was created by the law of 1 July 1998, passed to strengthen existing monitoring and health safety systems, in order to provide an improved response to the increasing diversity and interaction of health safety issues relating to healthcare products.

The pleyel site, located in Saint Denis, group a huge number of AFSSAPS collaborators. They saw the need of installinga secure and flexible access system with the possibility of adding different security levels. This project group 435 wooden doors and 225 glass doors.

Mr. Marc Tixeire AFSSAPS Security Manager told us that: “We wanted to secure around 700 offices doors with a systems which could adapt to our organization needs”. We host a lot of collaborators. They access rights are constantly changing. The aim was to secure all the offices which had old and classic mechanical locks. During our refurbishment, we were faced to another problem. How can we secure glass door offices? We needed to find out a one and unique access control solution for wooden doors and glass doors too. We decide for Salto System Access Control because Salto System offers a powerful and flexible electronic access control system which can be adapted on the fly and dynamically depending on the structures needs due to constants moves.

The Salto Systems access control version is interesting because it suits to our specifications and can be used using contact less Mifare carriers. Furthermore, Salto concept allows an automatic door locking assuring the security. Salto Systems brings us a flexibility in the security and management, and an incredible autonomy for the management of Mifare carriers with the Salto SAM kit. More over the Salto Virtual Net updater Hotspot, at the beginning was perceived= as a constraint by our collaborators. Now it’s a reflex action as it allows an automatic update of the user access profile, and an efficient lost card management system.

Secure Key Cabinet | Diplomat Safes

Chris — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 09:11:15 +0000

SERIES 1 – CHOOSING AN ACCESS CONTROL SYSTEM – SALTO Access Control – Case Study Oxford University Security

Chris — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 01:19:26 +0000

According to research by the Home Office, university students are far more likely than the national average to become victims of crime with opportunist thefts and burglary being the most commonly reported offences.

This is frequently due to the fact that for many young people, further education is their first experience of looking after themselves and living away from home. Consequently, they usually have little background knowledge of or experience of crime reduction measures. Most crimes are of an opportunist nature with the most frequent involving the theft of wallets, purses, bags, jackets and money from office areas, especially desks, drawers and lockers. But, of more concern is the problem of burglary. Thieves know that many students own high-value portable items such as laptop computers, i-pods, mobile phones and DVD players which can be easily sold on for cash and so this can make their rooms an easy target for property crime.

One university where the threat of crime is being taken very seriously is the University of Oxford. The oldest university in the English-speaking world, Oxford can lay claim to nine centuries of continuous existence and is determined to do all it can to protect its students. To help achieve this one of the youngest and smallest of the University’s 39 colleges, Mansfield College, has invested in an electronic access control system that has already resulted in a big reduction in campus crime.

Occupying one of the most attractive sites in Oxford, in a quiet position close to the Bodleian Library, River Cherwell and University parks, Mansfield College was established in 1886 and is renowned for combining the best of traditional Oxford with its own unique and innovative personality. The College admits students over a broad range of subjects and the student membership at any one time usually consists of 200 undergraduates, 70 graduates and 35 visiting students.

‘Oxford is, in general, a very safe city in which to live and study. However, burglary is a real problem in Oxford andit is important for our students to be aware of the need for personal security and crime prevention and to know that we are working closely with Oxfordshire Police to help us keep our campuses safe places to live and work’ says Mansfield College Head of Maintenance Tony Berezny. ‘With several other colleges at the University already using SALTO for their access control requirements we wantedto upgrade our own levels of security protection and sodecided to evaluate the technology for our own use. Havingdone this and found it offered pretty much everything we were looking for, we decided to introduce the system in

Mansfield College starting with just our external doors initially to see how users would adapt to it as it is quite different to our previous conventional keyed system. The actual technology itself was extremely simple to install and local SALTO business partner BMA Varsity Ltd, Oxfordshire’s leading locksmiths, carried out the job, installing 8 on-line WRM2000 wall readers controlled by i-Button read/write keys and a mix of electronic handle sets from the Comfort and Security ranges. This was all very straightforward with no undue problems despite the age and condition of some of the doors and their architectural surroundings.’

SALTO’s PRO-Access electronic locking system was also installed at the college to provide real-time on-line perimeter access control. This enables all the doors to be operated by one database (although it is powerful enough to control the entire campus if necessary) managing the intelligent electronic locks and i-Button keys for stand alone wirefree operation. All updating of the locks is achieved via the software with virtual on-line performance provided by theSALTO Virtual Network (SVN). This is a smart combination of on-line and stand alone readers that provide 90% of the benefits of a fully on-line access control system but without such a system’s attendant high costs.

The new access system was very quickly embraced by the students and staff at the college and the installation hasalready been expanded to include bedrooms in the studentaccommodation block and also to individual office doors,giving them control over a total of some 102 doors in amixture of on-line and off-line formats. These are currentlyaccessed via 550 i-Buttons in circulation with staff andstudents at the college.Ramesh Gurdev, one of SALTO’s UK Area Sales Managers comments: ‘The capability of multi-site growth built into the system has been key for the university offering them futurecompatibility and product longevity. They now have allexternal doors networked so that they have real time audit and instant management capability as well as these doors acting as the hotspot data transfer points. The flexibility of the read/write i-Button means that an ergonomic androbust fob type key can be used for data transfer within thesystem.

Tony Berezny concludes: ‘The University of Oxford andMansfield College in particular enjoys a relatively low rate ofcrime and we are working hard to keep it that way. We aredetermined that students and staff should continue to feelsafe and that their property is protected.We have found that SALTO has been invaluable in crimereduction and it has really improved the security of the campus. It has been fault free from day one and we planto expand the system on an annual basis as our budget permits.’

Diplomat Safes – Home Safe

Chris — Tue, 02 Aug 2011 06:24:47 +0000

Diplomat Home Safes with push button electronic digital lock (EDL) offer comfort, convenience, reliability and peace of mind.

The Diplomat range of document Home Safes are designed to meet a variety of home and business uses. Available in 4 different sizes, Diplomat safes keep your precious paper documents secure and protected from fire and theft.

SERIES 1 – CHOOSING AN ACCESS CONTROL SYSTEM – Salto Access Control – College Security Case Study

admin — Sun, 31 Jul 2011 21:52:30 +0000

Delaware College of Art and Design has chosen a smart access control solution from SALTO Systems to secure its urban campus student housing apartments.

Located at 600 North Market Street in the center of downtown Wilmington, the Delaware College of Art and Design (DCAD) is a creative partnership between the Pratt Institute and the Corcoran College of Art and Design, two of America’s oldest and most distinguished Colleges of the visual arts.

Housed in a historic art deco building that has been newly upgraded and renovated, its state-of-the-art educational facilities include computer imaging and graphics labs, darkrooms and photo studios and painting, drawing and design studios. It offers associate degree programs in six disciplines: Animation, Fine Arts, Graphic Design, Illustration, Photography and Interior Design.

“As specialists in the field of College-tailored access control systems, the SALTO XS4 solution was ideal for Delaware College of Art and Design,” comments Terri Sopko, SALTO Systems Inc, Regional Business Manager. “Working in consultation with DCAD we designed a highly secure and fl exible networked access control system to meet all of the requests of the College. The advanced system design incorporates XS4 electronic mortise locks with deadbolts, ‘Hotspot’ wall readers and rim panic devices all controlled via MIFARE enabled key fobs.

Since DCAD encourages residential students to be part of its downtown urban campus, it offers apartment style accommodation in the Saville Apartments directly across the street from its studio and academic facilities.

For most students this is their fi rst time living away from and many bring expensive electronic equipment including laptop computers, cell phones, DVD, CD and MP3 players with them with little thought that they could fall victim to thieves.

This means the College gives security considerations a high degree of importance and to protect against unauthorised intruders and combat potential thieves they needed to upgrade their security arrangements. To do this they wanted to migrate from an old fashioned mechanical key based system that was cumbersome to control, time consuming and expensive to replace if key security was breached to a modern smart access control system that could provide management audit trail information and lock battery status without having to visit all the doors in the building,” Sopko continues.

To achieve this 2 on-line hotspot wall readers utilising SALTO Virtual Network (SVN) technology have been fi tted in the Saville Apartments, one in the main entrance and one into the adjacent café entrance. These are complimented by 48 off-line XS4 locks fitted to each individual student apartment together with one rim panic device on the emergency exit door.

The XS4 system needs no hard wiring and provides a totally wire free networked electronic locking solution with a great range of features. It is designed around state-ofthe-art electronics that use distributed intelligence to pass information between microprocessors in the electronic handle set and the key fob. It allows the College to benefit from the many advantages of SVN and enables access profiles to be changed rapidly adding real value to the access management of the building.

Scott Straw, Director of Student Services at DCAD, said “It’s important to us that our students are safely and securely housed within the Saville Apartment complex. With the installation of our new access control system we no longer have the worry or cost of managing keys or changing lock cylinders, but can now update, restrict or deny access to any lock remotely. This gives us unmatched fl exibility and secure and accessible housing for our students, so choosing SALTO has been an excellent investment decision.”

SERIES 1 – CHOOSING AN ACCESS CONTROL SYSTEM – SALTO Access Control – What is this new security technology?

Chris — Sat, 30 Jul 2011 00:23:11 +0000

If you are looking for protection from uncontrolled access, SALTO can deliver theperfect solution, tailored to your exact requirements to provide you with all the security, convenience and control you need.

Our state-of-the-art electronic locking systems offer flexible and functional access control with a wide choice of software options. Our access control systems are designed to work in a wire free environment so there is no need to hard wire the building, allowing you to keep your original doors and locks in place. This makes installation fast, self contained and straightforward. An access control system that uses distributed intelligence in both the lock and the key to communicate wirelessly with PC based SALTO programming software that makes lock re-programming or re-keying a thing of the past.

Both key cards and locks can be programmed to allow or restrict access to different parts of the building. And the information stored in the key card can be transferred to a computer to provide precise audit trail information about where and when each lock has been used including the date, time and whether access was allowed or denied.

Combined with the additional functionality provided by the SALTO Virtual Network (SVN), users can achieve 90% of the benefits of a fully on-line system for the cost of a stand alone system. And now with the brand new XS4 on-line battery operated wireless lock system you can experience real time access control solutions without the need for wiring.

SALTO Systems unique new networked lock set can be used for a huge range of access control applications. It’s the first RFID system that can be upgraded at any time.

SALTO Systems Benefits

The SALTO wireless system combines the efficiency of both on-line and off-line applications in a single system.
Real-time communication with state-of-the-art SALTO stand alone battery powered escutcheons simplifies security management and provides unrivalled levels of access control flexibility.
It uses AES128 bits encrypted radio frequency communication based on IEEE 802.15.4 at 2,4Ghz to transfer information from escutcheons to the PC through strategically located gateways or repeaters.
The wireless system is so efficient that battery power consumption is close to that of our standard battery powered electronic escutcheons.
Real time audit trail: View door access in real time without having to visit the door.
Real time door control: view door status in real time.
Real time battery control: Monitor battery maintenance by viewing the lock battery status in real time.
Key management: Resolved in real time as the locks receive cancelled key updates as soon as they are generated.
Any number of doors can be equipped with the SALTO wireless system at much lower cost than a conventional wired access control solution.
Gateways and repeaters act as antennas, collecting and sending information from the PC to the stand alone wireless locks. One gateway can manage several repeaters and electronic escutcheons, minimizing infrastructure costs and maximizing flexibility.
The SALTO wireless system is compatible with most common RFID technologies including Mifare/DESfire, Inside Picopass, Legic and HID iClass. This makes integration easy and in most cases you can continue using your existing cards for all your applications.
The SALTO wireless system is completely integrated with the SALTO platform making it easy to customise to your exact needs and cost-effective to expand at a later date.
All SALTO escutcheons are also SVN (SALTO Virtual Network) compatible. So in the unlikely event that the RF connection is interrupted, SVN technology will enable the escutcheons to keep working normally, but off-line, without compromising security or control. And, there are no limits on access so all the cardholders in the system, however many there are, can continue to enjoy full access privileges while RF connection is re-established.

The SALTO Platform

The SALTO wireless system is managed through stateof- the-art Pro Access or HAMS SQL software that can handle up to 64 000 users and 64 000 devices. It enables users to manage a complete wireless network and all existing SALTO off-line devices such as escutcheons and cylinders.
With a single click of a mouse you can configure or make changes to the network in real-time
as only the gateways and repeaters have to be set-up, the wireless electronic escutcheons will be configured automatically through their self-organizing capabilities.
You can then monitor the wireless network, download audit trail information from the wireless escutcheons for real time control, delete users remotely and securely, collect battery status of the RF escutcheons for maintenance and much more all from a single PC and all in real-time.
And thanks to its self-healing capabilities, if an escutcheon should lose RF connection at any time it will automatically scan for a new connection to an alternative gateway or repeater, restoring communication and maintaining security.

You choose the level of security control you need.

From a simple self programmable system that needs no computer to manage it, through a highly capable mid-range ROM system up to the high performance data on card technology SALTO Virtual Network (SVN) system that allows you to control all the doors in an entire building or group of buildings from a single PC.

SALTO Selfprogrammable access control system

Unlike conventional locks where if the keys are lost you have the expense and inconvenience of replacing all the affected locks and keys – with the new SALTO XS4 RFID e-lock or e-cylinder self programmable system you just delete the missing key from the system and issue a new one to the user. It’s that simple.

And if your access control needs grow, the system can be upgraded at any time to a complete ROM access control system or to a data on card SVN system without having to change any of the door hardware.

SALTO ROM access control system

If you need a higher level of control over who is entering your building and when, the SALTO XS4 RFID ROM system is the answer. It provides all the benefits of a stand alone access control system in a compact, cost effective package.

No complicated wiring or other intrusive work is required and you can continue to use your existing mortise locks–reducing the installation cost. It’s easy to use Pro Access ROM software can be customized to suit your needs so you can ad users and doors, user groups and zones and set time periods and opening modes that instruct the door to lock or unlock automatically as needed.

And if your access control needs grow, the system can be upgraded at any time to a complete data on card SVN system without having to change any of the door hardware.

SALTO Data on card access control system

The SALTO XS4 data on card access control system is designed for use in larger buildings and enables users to work in a wire free environment so there is no need to hard wire. This allows you to keep your original doors and locks in place, making installation fast, self contained and straight forward.

It allows you to control your entire building remotely and in almost real time through the SALTO Virtual Network (SVN). This advanced software system allows stand-alone locks to read, receive and write information via its operating smart cards or ‘intelligent’ keys.

This data is captured from the cards at SVN on-line hot spots located at strategic points around the building.The “hot spot” uploads and downloads user related information that is then used to permit, control or deny access.

OH&S SAFETY SERIES 1 – “Fatal Five” Safety Lockout Tagout Errors

Chris — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 21:26:09 +0000

1. Failure to stop equipment. This may seem common sense, it actually isn’t, due to some employee attitudes towards OH&S. Some workers value productivity above safety, a good attitude if safety is under check, but not in this case. Others feel that their age or long experience with the equipment lets them work on it without checking and ensuring equipment is properly safeguarded. Either attitude can lead to injury, possibly even death.

2. Failure to disconnect from the power source. With electrical equipment, some workers feel that simply operating the on/off switch is all it takes to be safe. They don’t think that the switch may be defective or that a surge of power could find its way through a short circuit or other source until they are shocked to learn that it can.

3. Failure to drain residual energy. Ask workers why TV sets carry a warning about trying to open the case even if the device is disconnected. You know, and they should, that it’ss because many electrical devices store power in a capacitor or battery. Even with the plug out, the risk of shock remains. Employees need to expand that concept to other kinds of devices.
A compressed spring, a hot pipe, a pressurized tank, or even a heavy object hanging overhead also represent energy that continues to exist, even when the initial source of that energy is disconnected. All forms of stored energy must be completely blocked or released to be safe.

4. Accidental restart of machinery. Even if one employee knows to shut down equipment before working on it, others may not. The incidence of unknowing workers causing injury to their fellow workers by restarting machines being worked on is quite high.

5. Failure to clear work areas before restarting. Restarting machinery must be handled with as much care as shutting it down and locking it out. A repair tool left in the works to fly out, or a restart while a co-worker remains in the path of danger, represent as great a hazard as not locking out the machine at all.

OH&S SAFETY SERIES 1 – A Basic Risk Management Process Implimentation

Chris — Mon, 25 Jul 2011 21:34:11 +0000

You can take five basic steps in your workplace to create a health and safety risk management process to minimize your exposure to risks.

Preparation
Step 1 Identify all potential hazards.
Step 2 Assess the risks these potential hazards create.
Step 3 Decide on what measures to take to control the risk.
Step 4 Implement appropriate control measures and mechanisims.
Step 5 Monitor the control measures and review the process constistantly and regularly.

OH&S SAFETY SERIES 1 – Definition of Lockout Tagout

Chris — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 21:35:24 +0000

Whenever a person/persons is working on an installation or equipment where a safe system of work is
required. When this work is other than the normal operation of the equipment, such as
fault finding, maintenance or repair an increased level of risk is created.
The lockout tag out system is to be incorporated in all work practices to help reduce this risk.

Prior to commencing work on equipment all sources of hazard/energy and their isolation
points are to be identified. Possible sources include;

• Electricity
• Hydraulics
• Gravity
• Radiation
• Biological
• Chemical

Each person performing work is to be made aware of isolation points and is to effectively
lockout or control all energy sources affecting their work: this allows for group lockout
procedures, with an individually keyed lock and tags.

Be sure to impliment a Saftey Lockout tag out plan for your business. Save your staff, litagation and damage to property.

source: Univerisity of Queensland OH&S