EDITOR’S COMMENT
Living in interesting times, embracing fast-moving technology trends and focusing on the positive
President Cyril Ramaphosa.
No one can deny that we’re living in interesting times. The original expression that I learned at my dad’s knee is: “May you live in interesting times.”
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looked it up on Wikipedia and, as I remembered him telling me, it is actually a pleasantly veiled curse thought to have originated in China (“While seemingly a blessing, the expression is normally used ironically; life is better in “uninteresting times” of peace1 and tranquillity2 than in “interesting” ones, which are usually times of trouble.”) Whatever its original origin, it’s an apt description of life on earth at the moment, where the unexpected and the challenging are coming at us from all angles. Interesting doesn’t have to mean bad, in my opinion, though. Within the chaos, technology is being fast-tracked in part by the Covid-19 pandemic. With so
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many people working from home, businesses are looking for and adopting cutting-edge technology and tools that allow for more effective communication with staff and clients, that better protect their premises, assets, people and data against physical and cyber criminals as well as the virus, that improve operational efficiency, and that save them money. Genetec, a leading global security company, gives one of the most concise synopses of trends that I’ve read3. These include innovation around social distancing and occupancy management, choosing trusted vendors and deploying physical security solutions that come with layers of cyber defenses4, and focusing on public privacy concerns
SECURITY FOCUS AFRICA FEBRUARY 2021
related to Covid-19 contact tracing and other social challenges, which for “many physical security professionals, means facing the reality that their legacy security equipment and older proprietary systems can’t support the fundamentals of data security and privacy. This will increase the demand for newer solutions engineered with privacy by design.” Security entities will also need to follow the lead of other industries and their IT departments and determine how to best leverage cloud technology in the years ahead if they’re to thrive in the long run, and they’ll need to customise product and service portfolios for clients as opposed to the traditional ‘one size fits all’ offerings, Genetec adds.
securityfocusafrica.com
