To many security dealers and integrators, cloud-based access control is something that utilizes a cloud-first or cloud-only approach. Typically, it is used for hosted or managed access control, and is primarily aimed at smaller-sized end users that don’t have their own security or IT departments. Right? Not so fast.
There are commonalities when it comes to defining what access control in the cloud is — and what it isn’t. For example, Jeff Perri, president and COO, Prodatakey, South Jordan, Utah, defines it as a seamless environment for the user.
“In some cases you will find platforms in and out of our industry that tout they are cloud-based but really they are just Web-hosted from the site. What we find in the security industry is there is really this noise that has made it difficult to define what true cloud-based access control means. For us the definition is unity of platform. What I can do on my computer I can do from my smartphone or tablet and have 100 percent functionality on all platforms.”
BluBØX, Port Washington, N.Y., has a six-component definition of cloud-based access control systems, according to company president, Patrick Barry. These include: broad network access; on-demand self-service; a shared pool of configurable computing resources such as servers and storage applications; the capability to be elastic and rapidly provisioned and deployed; minimal and outsourced management; and measured service.
For Steve Van Till, president and CEO of Brivo, Bethesda, Md., the true cloud server is not necessarily public. “Publicly available means not a private server,” he explains. “We see some people taking old, non-cloud software, running it in a virtual private server and calling it cloud.”
Nor is cloud necessarily managed. It’s usually hosted, but that can get murky as well, Van Till says. “It can be a managed system without cloud. Many managed offerings hide the fact that they aren’t a cloud solution. People also equivocate on the term ‘hosted.’ Taking old software and putting it on a virtual machine at Amazon is hosted, but certainly not cloud.”
‘We are at a point in prevalence where every integrator needs to have access to a cloud-based solution of some type or they risk being left behind.’ — Peter Boriskin, ASSA ABLOY
Others are looser with their definition of cloud. Ross McKay, director of products for Pittsford, N.Y.-based LenelS2, part of UTC Climate, Controls & Security, a unit of United Technologies Corp., calls his company’s evolving cloud product line — which is starting with infrastructure as a service — a hybrid solution. “It will have some data on-prem and some off-prem. [Our customers] want to be very surgical about what data is within their own four walls and what data is outside.”
This is part of an emerging trend that may change or expand the definition of cloud, adds Peter Boriskin, vice president of product management at ASSA ABLOY Americas, New Haven, Conn. “In today’s cloud environment it is important to define cloud-based access control not only in what it does, but how it is set up. Some utilize a public cloud where the system is operated by a third party.…Meanwhile we are seeing larger enterprises and government entities that prefer to set up their own private cloud so they can be the custodians of their own data. We are also seeing hybrid models where confidential data can be stored onsite while the processing power can be handled by a third party.”
Boriskin says cloud-based access control isn’t so much a technology trend as it is a market trend. “We are seeing a whole new level of acceptance of the solution. There are now so many access control manufacturers leveraging the cloud that it is finding its way into all verticals and market segments.
“It’s hard to put an exact number on it, but it would be safe to say that current growth of cloud-based access control solutions is easily 10 times the growth of non-cloud solutions. More contextually, we are at a point in prevalence where every integrator needs to have access to a cloud-based solution of some type or they risk being left behind.”