Stanley Security has installed a biometric access control system at beverage company Finlays’ Pontefract site to protect its server rooms.
Finlays owns and operates tea estates, extraction facilities for tea, coffee and plant extracts, packing facilities and R&D laboratories across four continents. The company already had a PAC access control system in place for exterior doors, and number code locks were fitted to the doors of their server rooms but, reviewing security, Finlays wanted to improve the level of security for the latter. The key requirement was to ensure access to the server rooms be controlled by the IT department only. IT staff work standard office hours so should access be required to the server rooms outside of this, the code for the locks would have to be shared with others or a member of the IT team would have to return to site.
Finlays had ruled out a card/tag based access control system due to the inherent issues with lost, stolen or borrowed cards, and had decided a biometric system would be the right solution for them.
Stanley Security installed ievo biometric fingerprint readers to four server room doors. The system features image reading sensors that take a detailed scan of a finger from the surface and subsurface levels of the skin, to capture an accurate digital image whilst protecting against fake and spoof fingerprints. Specific data from the image is converted into a digital template used for fingerprint identification. Providing a user presents a finger that matches a stored user template, then access will be granted.
Finlays are pleased with the new biometric access control system as it provides the company with the security required but also convenience, as Stephen Firth, Finlay’s Group Senior IT Support Engineer comments: “Now, IT has full control of who enters the server rooms and there is an audit trail. We don’t have to worry about who has keys to the IT office and who knows the code for the server rooms door locks. What’s more, IT can open any door on the system remotely should it be required, rather than having to return to site. With one of the racks on our server belonging to someone else, that’s an important consideration should they need to gain access out of office hours.”
