Avon Calling for Access Control at Data Center

Integrator helped avert disaster when Avon's system crashed

Shortly after last Memorial Day, security officials at Avon Corporation faced a daunting challenge – the access control system for the company's sprawling corporate data center had crashed and was beyond repair. More than 700 employee access/identification badges were now worthless – and overall security compromised – at this large and important facility in New York's Westchester County.

Avon called Antar-Com Inc. (ACI), a White Plains, N.Y.-based systems integrator for help. ACI was given three weeks to tear out a 10-year-old access control system, completely rewire and install panels, provide and install new NT based servers with ID badging client stations, re-badge employees and program a new system to integrate with the newly installed video surveillance function. In only 21 days, ACI had to present Avon with a completely functioning access control and CCTV system.

Exactly three weeks after signing the contract, ACI turned over a fully functional new Software House C·CURE^® 800 security management system to Avon officials at the data center.

Located in Rye, N.Y., the single-story, 200,000-square foot facility houses Avon's worldwide data center. The center maintains records critical to the operation of the company. Also, certain administrative and accounting functions are housed there, as well as a daycare center with about 50 children of employees.

Publicly held Avon is the world's leading direct seller of beauty and related products, with $5.7 billion in annual revenue. Avon, headquartered in New York City, markets to women in 139 countries through 3.4 million independent sales representatives.

Ronn Broadway, Avon's director of global security, said employees arriving at the Rye data center by car use their access cards to enter a 558-space gated parking lot. Some employees commute to work by a train, which stops just outside the building perimeter. Those employees then access the building through a pedestrian entrance located near the loading docks. All employees carry their access cards – made by Irvine, Calif.-based HID Corp. – at all times while on the job.

Building entrances – there are a total of nine – are locked at all times. Visitors and vendors park outside the facility and walk to a reception area. There, a receptionist grants them access by pushing a button at her desk to release the lock. Once inside, visitors sign in, are issued temporary identification badges and are then escorted into the offices by an Avon employee.

Card readers control access to every entry to the critical data center, which is located within in the core of the building. Avon's information technology services staff is largely in charge of who may enter the data center, as well as when anyone may enter. While the center operates 24 hours a day, employees' access can be restricted to those certain times and/or days required to complete their jobs.

The C·CURE system allows the private security firm providing guards to the facility to monitor time and attendance of its employees. Avon, however, does not use that feature for its people.

Isac Tabib, ACI's vice president, said this project presented his staff with some major challenges, largely the result of the tightly condensed installation timetable.

"This was still a very busy place where people had to work each day, yet it was critical that we get an access system up and running as quickly as possible," he said. "Our plans had to minimize the impact on the people who still had jobs to complete. One way we accomplished that was by quickly creating CAD drawings, performing in house fabrication and testing while doing as much of the wiring as possible at night when there were fewer people onsite."

Within four days, ACI had managed to program the servers and ID badging station and make new badges for all employees. ACI technicians also had to modify an automatic sliding door in the facility so that it could be locked or unlocked by the C·CURE 800. All system programming was completed at ACI's offices so that when it was loaded onto the computer at Avon it would be ready to work immediately.

By the time ACI was finished, it had connected the C·CURE 800 to more than 40 card readers and five Software House apC/8x panels. The host computer downloads information into each panel's memory. That way, if the host were to fail, the system would still function to limit access to unauthorized personnel. The only temporary loss would be the recording of events. These would be stored on the apCs and uploaded to the host once communication had been re-established.

Tabib said the quick installation was also helped by the use of a Universal Interface Board (UIB), from ITG of Oyster Bay, N.Y. The UIB, a device used in many of ACI's major installations, links field devices, such as electrified locks and the apCs. The boards use color-coded wires and plugs to simplify system installation and maintenance. A total of 21 LEDs on each board indicate the status of the various connections, while 24 fuses protect the apCs from damage during electrical spikes.

All access control activities, including alarms, are monitored in a control room located near the main employee entrance. This 600-square-foot command center is manned around the clock. Every building entrance is monitored not only by the access system, but also by a video surveillance camera. A total of 32 dome and fixed cameras, from Corvallis, Ore.-based Kalatel, monitor the parking lot and loading docks, main hallways in the center, the entrances to the data center and the interior of the center itself, and is linked to the Ccure-800 access control and monitoring system for automatic camera call up and display to the guards in the event of system wide alarms.

Cameras also monitor an onsite store, where employees may purchase Avon products. While all cameras are viewed on four, 21-inch color monitors from Sony Security Systems from Park Ridge, N.J. in the command center, the data center manager can view video from his area on monitors located in his office. The daycare manager also has a monitor on her desk allowing her to watch the interior and exterior entries to her area. All video is recorded by VCRs also from Sony. Tapes are kept for 30 days and then recycled.

An audible signal is heard in the control room upon any access control system alarm. Also, an alarm activates the C·CURE system to immediately display the camera nearest to the alarm site so that the guards may have visual access to the situation to determine an appropriate response. Avon's information technology staff helped ACI to set up the access system on the company's wide area network. That allows the system to send emails to security officials in the event of an alarm situation. In the near future, Broadway said, alarms will also be registered in the main security office located in the Avon headquarters in Manhattan.

Broadway has been very pleased with the results of the new access control system and ACI's rapid response in getting it installed.

"Only three weeks after Avon contracted with ACI, we were using one of the best integrated access control/security systems on the market today," he said.

Broadway's wish list, which he hopes to fund in the near future, includes the addition of digital video recorders and the addition of a biometric element to the access system.

Originally Published:
March 2002, Access Control & Security Systems