Security System, any of
various means or devices designed to guard persons and property against a broad
range of hazards, including crime, fire, accidents,
espionage, sabotage, subversion, and attack.
Most Security System emphasizes
certain hazards. The principal security concerns are shoplifting and employee
dishonesty. A typical set of categories to be protected includes the personal safety of people in the organization, such as
employees, customers, or residents; tangible property, such as the plant,
equipment, finished products, cash, and securities, such as highly classified
national-security information or “proprietary” information (e.g., trade secrets) of private organizations.
An important distinction between a security and protection system and public
services such as police and fire departments is that the former employs
means that emphasize passive and preventive measures.
Security systems are found in a wide variety of
organizations, ranging from government agencies and industrial plants to
apartment buildings and schools. Sufficiently large organizations may have
their own proprietary security systems or may purchase security services by contract
from specialized security organizations.
By the
mid-19th century, private organizations such as those of Philip Sorensen
in Sweden and Allan Pinkerton in the United States had also begun to
build efficient large-scale security services. Pinkerton’s organization offered intelligence,
counterintelligence, internal security, investigative, and law enforcement
services to private business and government. Until the advent of collective
bargaining in the United States, strikebreaking was also a prime concern. The
Sorensen organization, in contrast, moved toward a loss-control service for industry. It provided
personnel trained to prevent and deal with losses from crime, fire, accident, and
flood and established the pattern for security services in the United Kingdom
and elsewhere in western Europe.
World Wars
I and II brought an increased awareness of security systems as a means of
protection against military espionage, sabotage, and subversion; such programs
in effect became part of a country’s national-security system. After World War II much of
this apparatus was retained as a result of international tensions and
defense-production programs and became part of an increasingly professionalized
complex of security functions.
The
development and diffusion of security systems
and hardware in various parts of the world has been an uneven process. In
relatively underdeveloped
countries, or the underdeveloped parts of recently industrializing countries,
security technology generally exists in rudimentary form,
such as barred windows, locks, and elementary personnel security measures. In
many such regions, however, facilities of large international corporations and
sensitive government installations employ sophisticated equipment and
techniques.
Since the 1960s, crime-related security systems
have grown especially rapidly in most countries. Among contributing factors
have been the increase in number of security-sensitive businesses; development
of new security functions, such as protection of proprietary information;
increasing computerization of sensitive information subject to unique
vulnerabilities; improved reporting of crime and consequent wider awareness;
and the need in many countries for security against violent.
Security
systems are becoming increasingly automated, particularly in sensing and communicating hazards
and vulnerabilities. This situation is true in both crime-related applications,
such as intrusion-detection devices, and fire-protection alarm and response
(extinguishing) systems. Advances in miniaturization and electronics are
reflected in security equipment that is smaller, more reliable, and more easily
installed and maintained.
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