Your keys should be kept out of sight

Recently on Facebook was someone asking where they could get keys cut as they needed an extra set. That is a normal request because not everyone knows where you can get that done. People were giving lots of great suggestions and then I saw a comment that made me very concerned.

If you send me a photo of both sides of your key, I will let you know if I can cut it for you.

The reason I was so concerned about this is this is a major issue because someone with a 3D printer and a photo of a key could make a copy of the key very easily. Of course, as soon as I saw this comment, I sent a private message to the individual asking where to get keys cut to not send a photo of her keys to anyone especially someone you don’t know.

It has been shown that from a picture people (bad actors) can make copies of keys and the type of keys that can be copied very easily are the ones that use the standard blanks. It is always important to make sure that you don’t have your keys visible for someone to take a photo of them.

There are so many times that I have seen people either wearing their keys or a fob on their bag or their belt, and I think they are calling for someone to take a picture of their keys. We have also seen pictures of a security office with a window that showed all the keys that they needed to use and of course that meant the people (bad actors) could copy those keys without any problem. So, remember when you are out in public or asked to provide a picture of your keys it isn’t a good idea because that person that is right near you might not be acting in your interest but in theirs.

Security & BYOD, is it good for your business?

Security isn't just the locks on the doors. Part of it can also be having the proper policies, procedures and processes in place.

For companies, security should be something that is continually thought about and enhanced. When a security feature is put into place it must be maintained and not forgotten about. In so many cases a security feature needs to be continually updated due to the every changing environment. Something else to consider is, has a security feature been “temporarily” turned off when fixing another issue and not been turned back on.

Here is something that really needs to be thought about. Think about the whole BYOD (bring your own device) situation for companies. Is the BYOD something your company has thought about or is dong? BYOD isn't just the tablets and smart-phones, it is also the external hard-drives, usb keys, flash drives and laptops.

If you are considering changing from company issues devices to employee owned devices you might want to think about some of these points:

• Ownership of the device and do you have the legal right to access the data on it?
• The actual management of the data on the device and who is responsible for backing up the data, it should be the responsibility of the owner of the device.
• When do staff have access to the corporate data and what data is available to each person.
• What data can be saved to the personal devices and taken off-site.
• Are there policies about BYOD, usage, backing up data, etc.
• Are there standard devices or can you bring in whatever you want.
• Who manages the devices, if not corporate property it should be the corporate staff that is responsible.
• If a BYOD device is infected and is plugged into the corporate network it then infects the corporate network. The infection is now the corporate IT's staff problem.
• The devices need to be updated and patched on a regular basis. Who is responsible for that?

These are just a few of the points that need to be thought about when deciding to implement the whole BYOD idea for a company. So, when you think about the whole BYOD program, think about all the hidden costs to the business. Are these costs something that a business wants to incur or is it something that could be avoided with the right equipment, policies and procedures.

It has actually been shown that it is cheaper to issue corporate devices than to try and maintain the BYOD items. This is is true when the company issues a list of standard supported devices because of all the other issues that can happen.

Security for a business will be an ever growing thing. Do you want some of the risks that BYOD can bring to your business? By having the necessary equipment provided from within you can eliminate some of these hidden risks and unknown costs.

Security can be summed up this way “Security is not having to say I'm Sorry”.