Why The Public Thinks Security Lacks Credibility

May 1, 2004 12:00 PM, LARRY ANDERSON, Editor

Six security employees and a supervisor have been removed from duty at a Florida nuclear power plant because an audit found the guards did not complete their patrols. This recent news snippet is only the latest in an ongoing undercurrent of media coverage — which often translates into public opinion — about our industry. The underlying message goes something like this:

“Security is a joke. Security guards are untrained and inattentive. They can't keep guns or knives off our airplanes. All that security equipment is good for is to invade our private spaces and trample on our civil rights. The really dangerous terrorist targets aren't being guarded. But let's ‘increase security’ because Tom Ridge has changed his color to orange.”

Being a security professional in this day and age is a thankless task. The nature of the news media is that something gets noticed only when it is bad or out-of-the-ordinary, which means that security only makes the news when it fails. The monumental successes of our industry go unreported, and therefore largely unnoticed by the public at large.

There are three ways security ends up on the news, and therefore on the radar screen of most Americans. One is when something sad or scary happens and the question emerges: What happened to security? The second way is if somebody does something stupid — a guard falls asleep on the job, a gun gets smuggled on an airplane. The public expects security professionals to perform their jobs perfectly — and somebody has to be held accountable if it isn't so.

And the third way is when politicians and other leaders talk about increasing security because of a big event, a change in the color-code, etc. It is instructive to notice that the first two instances tend to tear down the image of security, while the third instance raises expectations about its effectiveness. No wonder the perception is that we are falling short.

Because of all of these factors, the practice of security lacks credibility among the public at large, and there's probably not much we can do about it.

It won't change as long as there is a single imperfect security guard in the whole country who does something dumb and gets on the news and into Leno's monologue. It won't change until we can guarantee 100 percent security perfection — with no margin of error. That's what public opinion demands, although no one has the stomach to pay the price — the monetary expense or the costs to our way of life.

YOUR THOUGHTS

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