Safe Passage Security Training Blog

It’s a scene you’d expect to see from Netflix’s hit series Orange is the New Black. Prison guards storm inmate cells simultaneously to conduct a shakedown. Except in this case, it’s not a show. It’s real life and it has happened at several facilities overseen by the Mississippi Department of Corrections over the past couple of months.

The MDOC’s goal? Combat contraband behind bars.

And it’s not just the MDOC. Many prisons and correctional facilities have emphasized confiscating contraband as one of their top priorities.

Typically located in centralized areas for easy access by many, courthouses are an essential part of critical infrastructure. Every day, thousands of people around the world gather there to attend hearings and trials and to handle other legal matters.

Considering the nature of activities taking place, courts can become vulnerable to acts of violence. That’s why courthouses everywhere are taking the necessary steps to protect their property, the visitors and employees, as well as the integrity of the judicial system.

An airport employee goes between secure and insecure areas to smuggle drugs and weapons. A contract worker with airside access places explosives on an airplane. A former worker provides detailed intelligence to a terrorist organization about the inner-workings of a major airport.

The thought of an insider threat brings considerable concern to organizations operating in the aviation industry. It’s not a new concept, but it’s receiving rising attention today because of recent security breaches. Will airports around the world adopt full employee screening as a countermeasure?

The Dress – over 73 million page views on the original Tumblr post and 480,000+ notes after just 2.5 days. Why is there all this fuss about the color of that dress? As reported by almost every social media outlet on the planet, some see white and gold and others see blue and black. It just shows us how funny the human brain can be. Somehow the picture of that dress destroys the brain’s ability to discern between colors.

I saw one post that said, “It is a collision of color, illumination, and reflection.” I thought it was very interesting that “illumination” was used to describe this phenomenon. What I found, doing a little old fashioned research, is that it’s very easy (especially in photographs) to change the perceived color of an object by changing the illumination.

Terror threats are a real concern and they’re not going away anytime soon. Many would actually agree that attacks have been steadily increasing in number all around the world.

Unfortunately, we’re constantly seeing media coverage and reports of plots, attacks, and aftermaths. We’ve learned quite quickly that virtually any organization in any industry could fall victim to an attack.

That’s why it’s important to stay informed on the latest security threats and attacks happening around the world. Here’s a timeline of notable events from over the past three months.

A lot of companies out there are regulated by government entities that conduct random audits of screening procedures and training records. These unannounced audits cause a great deal of stress on supervisors and managers involved in gathering last minute reports with hopes it’s enough to satisfy auditors and receive a passing grade.

Truth be told, there’s no way of knowing what elements auditors will inspect when they arrive, but that doesn’t mean you can’t be proactive to boost likelihood of success during an inspection. These training and administration best practices can apply to many aviation and cargo security training programs including:

• TSA Certified Cargo Screening Program (CCSP)
• TSA Aircraft Operator Standard Security Program (AOSSP)
• TSA Indirect Air Carrier Standard Security Program (IACSSP)
• TSA Full All-Cargo Aircraft Operator Standard Security Program (FACAOSSP)
• TSA Model Security Program (MSP)
• EU Air Cargo or Mail Carrier operating into the Union from a Third Country Airport (ACC3)
• EU Commission Regulation No. 185/2010
• UK Regulated Agent Air Cargo Security Training Programme

Workplace supervisors have day-to-day responsibilities they must attend to including overseeing employees, ensuring productivity is maintained, and reporting to management. Part of their duty involves coaching employees, but sometimes that role expands into a full-on trainer position.

Many companies experience this – supervisors are forced to take on additional responsibilities in order to provide employees with security training in compliance with regulations or programs such as EU 185/2010, AOSSP, IACSSP, FACAOSSP, MSP, or CCSP. When supervisors double as security trainers, they’re only fulfilling a short term role so supervisors generally do not get the guidance and support needed to be successful in delivering training.

Everyday security screeners at airports all over the world have a very difficult job to do. Security screeners often lack up-to-date threat information as they screen hundreds of passenger bags each day. They rely on any current information provided by local authorities and their own historical knowledge to make the best decisions possible.

Talking with security screeners from a wide variety of international airports about this issue, one common theme prevails. There is no formal mechanism for sharing such threat information. In most cases, the best sources for getting information about new or emerging security threats are via the media or when items are found at the checkpoint where the security screener works.

There is often a lot of criticism about how security screeners do their job. The mainstream and social media offer many accounts about how screeners don’t know what they are doing and how they search passenger bags inconsistently from one airport to the next.

Certainly, there is room for improvement for all of us. However, when we look at the characteristics of a security screener and his work environment and compare them to those of a radiologist, we might all decide to give screeners a break.

Here’s an infographic comparing an X-ray screener to a radiologist.

It seems like over the past fifteen years, we’ve heard a lot about the Improvised Explosive Device, otherwise known as IED. An IED is a homemade or noncommercial explosive device used to cause pain and mass destruction. It has been a prominent threat tactic used largely by terrorists in package, suicide, car, and roadside bombs to target both soldiers and civilians.

Despite recent media spotlight on these IED attacks in the past few decades, you might be surprised to learn these were originally devised over a century ago. Since then, the terminology has changed and the device itself has evolved, but the core concept of the Improvise Explosive Device remains the same.