Security Industry Association

The Security Industry Association (SIA) is a fullservice, international trade association. The security industry was a $130 billion industry in 2005. It is a broad one that offers protective measures to communities, organizations, and people to alleviate risk, danger, doubt, anxiety, or fear. Security is the condition of being protected against danger or loss.

The security industry is concerned with safety, continuity, and reliability. Safety means the condition of being safe and free from danger, risk, or injury. Safety devices include those designed to prevent accidents, such as a lock on a firearm preventing accidental firing. Continuity means an uninterrupted succession or flow. Systems that provide continuity include disaster recovery systems and backups, for example, generators. Reliability refers to the probability that a system will satisfactorily perform its intended function and behave as we expect it to behave.

Many threats to security stem from external forces; so the industry takes into account the actions of active malicious agents attempting to cause destruction. The security industry includes tangible things that give or assure safety, such as security guards, controlled access systems, and alarm systems, as well as intangible things, such as measures adopted by a government to prevent espionage, sabotage, or attack. A secure system is one that behaves exactly as it is expected to even when external forces try to make it behave differently. The security industry is concerned with risk (the possibility that an event that could cause a loss will occur), threat (the method of triggering risk), countermeasures (ways to stop a threat from triggering risk), and assurance (guarantees that a secured system will behave as expected).

Security measures are generally taken around physical security, building and asset security, information security, and computer systems. Recent security efforts include those enacted by transportation systems, such as at airports and seaports, and the food industry (to prevent contamination). A general principle is that one should never rely on one single security measure alone. Often multiple means of security are built in.

Member companies of the SIA deal with numerous ethical issues. The most compelling are those around privacy and surveillance. For example, the technology of radio frequency identification has raised questions about unauthorized reading of one's personal information—although one should keep in mind its beneficial uses, such as law enforcement using it to locate 911 callers. Other ethical issues include the reliance on biometrics. Some biometric identification methods, such as retina scans, are relatively intrusive and could create a loss of a person's sense of privacy and dignity. Also, the public sentiment toward the use of biometrics like fingerprints may have a negative perception—that is, fingerprinting may be associated with criminal behavior. People feel embarrassed when rejected by a public sensor. Some methods (e.g., face recognition in public places) could be used to track someone's movements without their knowledge or consent.

Ethical questions also arise about how data are stored and used. Safeguards and ethics policies are needed regarding limiting how electronic information is moved and duplicated, who has access to this information, and the proper uses of the information.

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