--- Forwarded Message from Ursula Williams <[log in to unmask]> ---

>In-Reply-To: <[log in to unmask]>
>Date: Tue, 1 Jun 1999 10:40:28 -0500
>To: Language Learning and Technology International Information Forum               <[log in to unmask]>
>From: Ursula Williams <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Re: #5039 trip-line security

------------------
Hi Wendy, and anyone else interested in this topic. Here at Notre Dame we
had our Security Police install a security system that includes motion
sensors, devices on the doors (one part on the jamb and one part on the
door. The ones on the doors don't touch, so I suspect it may work on some
sort of magnetic field concept) and trip wires as you describe, except that
it is actually optical fiber. The latter are much like what you see in
department stores to secure portable electronic equipment. There's a number
pad mounted by the telephone in the main lab. The system resembles home
security systems I have seen, as a matter of fact. This has been in place
for about five years and has been very effective. The beeping from the
alarm is so loud that it alerts everyone in the room. The system also
contacts security. Officers have been extremely prompt in arriving, even
though every single one of our alarms has been a false one. (We trip it
inadvertently by forgetting to bypass it when we move equipment. In one
case, someone's foot got entangled in a coiled trip wire that had fallen
from its hook.) I certainly believe that the false alarms have been
beneficial as a deterrent. Everyone leaps into action, and a campus cop
shows up. Students believe that everything in here is wired. In the case of
iMacs, we just ran the wire through the handle. You could also run it
through the "grommet" in that little door that accesses ports, but I think
somebody could just get that door off, so the carrying handle is probably
better.

Our lab is divided into zones. One zone can be bypassed while the rest
remain armed. Each student worker has a unique security code, and we can
easily identify who did what. Housekeeping has a code as well, and the
police do, but that's all. Effectively, no one can even get into the labs
unless we know about it.

Hope this helps.

Ursula





>--- Forwarded Message from Wendy Baker Davis <[log in to unmask]> ---
>
>>Date: Thu, 27 May 1999 09:11:31 +0100
>>From: Wendy Baker Davis <[log in to unmask]>
>>Subject: trip-line security
>>To: [log in to unmask]
>
>I am struggling with how to secure 16 new IMacs in my Language Resource
>Center.  They don't appear to have any built-in slots for "kablit-style"
>locks or even a cable-guide to thread a security cable through.  At other
>institutions I visited years ago, some directors had a sort of "trip-line"
>that was threaded through all the computers and ?sounded an alarm if
>someone pulled a cpu out and away from the others, cut it, or tried to
>unthread it.  If you have/had such a system, could you please tell me
>briefly how it actually functionned and how well it worked and any details
>on price or vendor if you know it.  Any other suggestions would be welcomed
>as well.
>Thanks
>Wendy