ESSENTIAL SECURITY
SECURITY OF DEVICES, DEVICES OF SECURITY: A RECENT HISTORY
Phillip Pini, Director of Residential Sales (UK) at Crestron looks at some recent security trends. Homeowners — and, by extension, the developers they serve — have, in recent years, become acutely aware of the need for security, both physical and digital. An example: I live on a street with 100 homes. At the beginning of the pandemic, two of those dwellings had video doorbells. Now, two and a half years later, some 57 homes have them (yes, I counted). It’s easy to understand why these devices are popular: they’re simple to deploy, and they provide a certain sense of security for those homeowners. But the bulk of them are, after all, entry-level products. And as they become increasingly ubiquitous, the adage that ‘anything that can be hacked, will be hacked,’ becomes a greater and greater concern. That’s why firms catering to the luxury market must be ever more vigilant: we’re getting smarter, but the bad guys are, too.
• Best-in-class products that are shipped globally should adhere to the standards and protocols of the countries with the toughest legislation. The U.S. government has incredibly stringent standards for the products used by its military and intelligence agencies, so that makes for a terrific baseline for deployments in even the most luxurious homes. Think about access control, for example: all the third-party manufacturers we work with have a very secure language that they operate within. • Default passwords should never be obvious — or repetitive. One very simple way to ensure that? Use every item’s unique serial number as the default password for that particular device. (I can’t take credit for that idea, by the way — that must have been something cooked up by one of our smarter engineers; it’s so simple and elegant.)
surveillance footage and images will become
THE PROPER DEFAULTS
• Testing for potential vulnerabilities is ongoing, always. If there’s a potential weakness anywhere, you certainly want to find it before it’s discovered by a bad actor. And all thirdparty products must be carefully vetted before they even come close to being offered by a high-end nameplate.
surveillance technologies.
When it comes to higher-end devices — frankly, anything that sits on a network and could potentially have some kind of vulnerability — there are certain practices that best-in-class firms provide: • All security features, on every device, are ‘on’ by default. Take the device out of the box, turn it on, and security’s enabled. Installers literally have to manually turn off any security element.
36 OCTOBER 2022
We’ve seen a great many incidents of doorstep burglary in the UK, especially as people availed themselves of online ordering during lockdowns. The growth of ‘smart lockers,’ boxes where delivery people can securely leave a package until the customer is ready to unlock the cabinet, will continue to grow in popularity. Beyond that, cameras and CCTV systems are
becoming
ever-more
complex.
The
advancements in megapixels will continue, and clearer and clearer. Add that to a growing list of features that provide optimal security for the residences of high-net-worth individuals — night vision, heat detection, RF blocking technologies that could prevent a drone from effectively spying on a home — and you quickly understand the constantly evolving nature of Lastly, I think more and more people see the hidden benefits of robust systems, whether we’re speaking of physical or cyber security. It’s more than protecting people and property — these solutions can also bring tremendous peace of mind.
WHAT’S NEXT
As the concept of ‘security of devices’ is ever evolving, so too are the ‘devices that provide security.’
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