From creating attack profiles to building a better firewall, recent changes in the security landscape have shown what is no longer effective in fighting security breaches. For example, it’s common knowledge that intruders can leverage physical system flaws in a number of different ways. If you are in IT, then data security is your responsibility and it goes without saying that the IT infrastructure is as well. This is particularly important in these security-conscious times with the threat of accidental and malicious interference hanging over any data center operation, no matter how large or small.
So cabinet security – gaining lawful physical entry to a data center facility – is receiving increased attention. While all IT practitioners possess a certain amount of security knowledge, companies need to anticipate attacks and initiate pro-active, risk-management approaches. This applies especially to all-round reliability of fingerprint security, meaning that a growing number of clients are now securing their IT resources at this cabinet level, integrating the data feed from the scanner to other forms of security such as video surveillance.
It now takes seconds to verify a fingerprint at the scanner level and the process can update to/from a centralized server on a regular basis. Moreover, the enrollment process is similarly enhanced, with a typical enroll involving three sample fingerprints being taken on a terminal, and the user then able to authenticate themselves from that point onwards. Unlike a physical token such as swipe-cards, RFID contactless cards as well as key codes the fingerprint biometric is uniquely personal to the owner. Skills such as security assessment, network vulnerability, data loss prevention, Web content filtering, and threat analysis are just some of the capabilities in which all IT professionals should be knowledgeable and at least minimally competent.
While these represent the reality of corporate computing today, security specialization such as security at the cabinet level is an important part of the audit process in a growing number of organizations. In addition, a growing number of clients – especially those that rent space on a colocation basis, either on a local/remote or a private cloud computing basis – and who are looking for an auditable GRC (governance, risk and compliance) security system, feel that per-cabinet security is long overdue. Not only must they provide cabinet security, these organizations must also be able to prove the efficacy of their audit systems to one or more governance bodies. While not every IT professional must be able to perform a penetration test against their datacenter, they do need to have a solid grounding in security and what it takes to prevent attacks. Fingerprint security at the cabinet level is on its way to affordability and the impetus for this level of security it will only gain strength.
Edited by Carrie Schmelkin