New Groundbreaking Business Intelligence from RETEL Technologies

On their FACEBOOK page RETEL Technologies, when describing itself says it develops advanced software that integrates with existing surveillance cameras to deliver never-before-available insights about the real world, and the people and things in and around it.
RETEL Technologies, Inc., an advanced retail data firm, announced the release of its groundbreaking ReView In-Store Insight Suite recently.  With the introduction of ReView, bricks and mortar retailers now have access to a system that gives them instant and constant insight to shopper behavior at a level of cost and ease never before available. 
ReView combines easy-to-deploy tracking systems, proprietary analytics software, a visual reporting suite and available value-added consulting services to draw deep insights from consumer behavior in bricks and mortar retail environments.
A recent Deloitte survey showed that over 60% of all manufacturers and retailers now rate shopper marketing as a significant marketing function within their organizations -- yet fully 70% of them also believe that limited, expensive access to in-store data collection and analysis is one of the biggest factors limiting the growth of these programs. 
"Until now, most retailers could only measure ongoing consumer response through sales data from their registers or point-of-sale systems. While this data provides a great indicator of performance, it ignores the massive shopper insights to be gained between the front door of the store and the register," said Adam Rodnitzky, RETEL's Chief Marketing Officer. "By deploying our ReView suite, retailers and manufacturers of any size can efficiently and cost-effectively gain instant, ongoing insight to how consumers interact with store layout, merchandise, marketing and more…not just what those consumers ultimately buy." 
Compared to other methods to measure in-store behavior such as personnel-based audits and temporary video-tracking studies, the ReView system uses a highly-scalable, technology-based foundation to continually capture consumer behavior. According to RETEL's CEO George Aspland, "What we've found in speaking with a number of retailers and manufacturers is that they have been limited in their ability to capture information from within the store. Existing methods only let them survey a small sample of shoppers during a limited time frame. What we do lets them take a real census -- that is, tracking every shopper for every minute they are open for as long as they want." 
The ReView suite is designed to capture consumer behavior that provides actionable insights on merchandising, operations, marketing and store layouts. Metrics measured include shopper conversion rates; category correlations; popular consumer paths through stores; staff to customer ratios and checkout queue lengths; absolute measurement of in-store media impressions; incremental traffic from out-of-store media; and a number of other metrics. ReView can also display compelling visual data to assist retail management in making rapid assessment of their stores' productivity. Visual data includes heat maps of consumer behavior in retail environments, planogram compliance, as well as real-time snapshots of customer paths and activity in stores. 
ReTel is currently in talks with a number of retailers, CPG manufacturers and retail consultants to initiate pilot tests of its system in a variety of retail formats. The company is seeking additional pilot partners to broaden results from the first set of ReView deployments. 


I am very excited about how this technology can be used.  I see many other applications, especially with compliance issues within the enterprise.  Any operational, HR or asset protection policy or procedure that needs audit enforcement and verification can be met head on with this technology go to http://www.reteltechnologies.com for more information or drop me a note and I will arrange a demonstration or trial for your organization. 

Great FBI video "Caught on Camera"

Take a look at this great video from the FBI - Caught on Camera is a video created by the FBI's Operational Technology Division to show business owners how their security cameras can aid law enforcement investigations and maybe even help stop a terrorist attack. More at:http://www.fbi.gov/page2/mar10/cctv_0...  I have always designed my surveillance solutions to create good evidence for law enforcement in a worst case situation. My view has always been that the better the evidence the better law enforcement and the TV stations will work for you.

New Verizon IT Consulting Services Target Gaps in Physical Security

Although physical security is integral to IT security, it is often an afterthought, which leaves an organization vulnerable to security breaches. Verizon Business is addressing this shortcoming by offering new IT security consulting services that proactively integrate physical security with information security and compliance programs.
Verizon Physical Security Services combine a physical security assessment and penetration test, security awareness training, a social engineering experiment, and an evaluation of relevant logical security technologies such as smart cards and biometric scanners to evaluate and strengthen an organization’s overall security posture.
“Organizations know that a proactive approach to security is key to protecting critical assets, but too often they overlook physical security considerations, such requiring access cards to enter a facility, making this one of the weakest links in the security chain,” said Dr. Peter Tippett, vice president of technology and innovation at Verizon Business. “Our research shows that simple security measures, done well, can make a big difference to an organization’s ability to prevent data breaches. These new services help companies address both their information and physical security requirements in a holistic manner, helping to more effectively protect the organization – and its own customers – from security breaches.”
Data from the 2009 Verizon Business Data Breach Investigations Report demonstrate the importance of physical security for data protection. For example, the report showed that only 43 percent of organizations had properly restricted physical access to confidential cardholder data according to PCI-DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard) requirements. In other words, 57 percent of organizations had left cardholder data open and exploitable via a physical breach.
According to research project DataLossDB, many data loss events could have been prevented with better physical security.
New Verizon Consulting Services Integrate Physical and Information Security
Verizon Physical Security Services are designed to help safeguard the entire IT stack --that is, the physical, network, application, data and end-user layers -- by addressing three major areas of weakness:
Access -- This includes visitor badge issuance and adherence, door access controls and lock configurations and detection/monitoring mechanisms.
Safety -- Addresses placement and status of alarm systems, material handling at the site and visible, functioning fire alarms.
Environment -- An evaluation is made of the company’s location, including the neighborhood and surrounding businesses, to determine the risk of criminal activity or collateral damage.
All evaluations cover the organization’s entire operations, including corporate offices, data centers and warehouses as well as document storage and disposal. Additionally, Verizon Physical Security Services help to maintain compliance with regulations that include specific physical security procedures, such as the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, PCI-DSS and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation.
Verizon Security Meets the Demanding Needs of Today’s Businesses
Verizon Business offers a rich portfolio of security solutions, including threat and vulnerability services; governance, risk and compliance solutions; data loss and prevention solutions; and identity management solutions. The solutions are delivered by the company’s more than 1,200 security professionals around the globe. More information is available by visiting http://www.verizonbusiness.com/products/security. The company also provides additional security insight and analysis via the Verizon Security Blog.


About Verizon Business
Verizon Business, a unit of Verizon Communications (NYSE, NASDAQ: VZ), is a global leader in communications and IT solutions. We combine professional expertise with one of the world’s most connected IP networks to deliver award-winning communications, IT, information security and network solutions. We securely connect today’s extended enterprises of widespread and mobile customers, partners, suppliers and employees – enabling them to increase productivity and efficiency and help preserve the environment. Many of the world’s largest businesses and governments – including 96 percent of the Fortune 1000 and thousands of government agencies and educational institutions – rely on our professional and managed services and network technologies to accelerate their business. Find out more at www.verizonbusiness.com.


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Need a Pick-Me-Up

Thanks Paul

“What am I going to do now to reduce shrink even more than before?”

I finally had a moment to sit down and read the March-April edition of Loss Prevention Magazine and I just read an article by Kevin M. Plante entitled “The Next Great Thing to Reduce Shortage” (http://www.losspreventionmagazine.com/archives_view.html?id=2568) and I found it to be excellent. 

As a long time student of loss prevention I have believed that my job is to influence the behaviors of my client’s customers and employees with technology. To do this I use solutions such as: Video Surveillance, Access Control Solutions, Electronic Article Surveillance (EAS), Alarm Panels, Point of Sale Systems (POS), and any other system or equipment that can be monitored like HVAC or specifically a temperature control in a walk-in cooler. We can collect data from all of these devices and with understanding use that data to predict areas of potential risk or fraud.

Kevin’s article discusses the recent availability of biometric solutions which will improve my “Trust but Verify” belief of making sure your employees are doing their job.

Make sure you find the right software to bring all the available information together. If you need any suggestions just drop us a note or give us a call and we can make some suggestions based on your needs. We all want to do all that we can to protect your BRAND from risk and fraud so that your business can be as profitable as it can be in today’s volatile marketplace.

Great article Kevin!

The Physical Security Cloud in 2010

Should all physical security systems be accessed in the cloud? Is this tru convergence? Will It be easier to interface other applications such as Business Intelligence (BI) applications for the average user? What is the Risk?

For everyone involved in trying to protect their organizations' network users and data, a move to cloud computing will present a huge change and challenge. Compliance regulations will most likely prevent an enterprise from moving all its data and operations to the cloud, so the transition is in fact an additional security challenge on top of protecting existing network infrastructures. Moving to the cloud requires data and applications to be placed outside the comfort zone of well-established perimeter defenses and physical access controls. An increasing number of users who don't come under the controls of HR, such as suppliers, clients and partners, will access your data via Web-based collaboration tools. IT administrators already struggle with the task of securing mobile users who access corporate networks, but cloud computing is on a different scale altogether.

For me, one of the key security challenges is how to efficiently manage and enforce access control for employees, customers and partners beyond the enterprise firewall. Cloud computing turns us all into remote workers, and cloud applications and data, by definition, are outside the enterprise. This means that you can no longer rely on multiple layers of authentication, firewalls and other perimeter defenses to do the job for you.

Strategically, managing these challenges requires a number of actions. HR security policies must be reviewed and tightened up so they enforce robust lifecycle management of users. A detailed identity and access management strategy must also be put in place, one that makes full use of federated identity management, an arrangement that enables users to securely access data or systems across autonomous security domains. I recommend enabling single sign-on (SSO) within your own enterprise applications and leveraging this architecture to simplify cloud provider integration and implementation.

In the near future, cloud-based services and cloud computing technology will come under increased and prolonged attack because they're attractive targets for hackers and cyberterrorists. Building a data encryption strategy and implementing technology to support it, therefore, is the best proactive defense. Encrypted data is intrinsically protected, which is why so many laws and regulations mandate the practice. All data and communications should be encrypted, even if other services protect them. Encryption also allows you to separate roles and data as encryption keys control access to your data.

2010 will certainly see many new cloud-based services coming online, many offering substantial economic benefits for enterprises. Some will no doubt change long-established risk-reward relationships, and you will need to review your organization's business strategy and appetite for risk when assessing the ROI of a switch to a cloud-based service. Cloud computing is changing IT so will it also change Physical Security be sure to consider any new business processes so that infrastructure, data and users remain protected.

EFFECTIVE OPERATIONAL RISK MANAGEMENT TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS

I just started work on "EFFECTIVE OPERATIONAL RISK MANAGEMENT TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS" an E-book discussing Physical and IT Risk Management Synergy thru the true convergence of technology to a Single Platform that is available in today’s multi-location and mobile enterprise networked environment. Those of you who would like to give me some input, please contact me directly.

-JM



"I was bold in the pursuit of knowledge, never fearing to follow truth and reason to whatever results they led, and bearding every authority which stood in their way."
- Thomas Jefferson