Security EPIC FAIL

[Dave1982]

Alright, for obvious reasons I'm not saying where this is or anything, but the site I'm at today has a serious problem with their door locks......according to the WRITTEN PROCEDURE for opening the lobby area, you are to "unlock doors using the screwdriver."

This is a typewritten procedure, and it doesn't look new.

Someone needs to get their locks fixed....

[Sandman]

oh boy... now i have never seen that before in my travels!

[Pimento]

Hopefully thats not also how they start all their work vehicles as well.

I also hope that its not a memo posted on the door or some such thing

[Dave1982]

Well, once closing time at this place rolled around and they came out to do this, I saw that it's for switching the push-bar doors to one-way mode, not for the locks themselves.....except that there is also a regular lock as well that does not appear to be in use......(unless there's a designated person who locks up once everyone else leaves).

So....not *quite* as bad as I thought, but not much better.

[SuperDan]

My former church was like that with the outer set of doors--one door could be opened from the outside with a key, all could be opened from the inside via the crash bar. To make all doors accessible from the outside for a church service (or during office hours for the office door), it was necessary to get the allen key from under the usher's desk, hold the crash bars down to the unlock position, and use the allen key to tighten a bolt under the handle to hold it in unlock position. Both the main entrance and the office entrance had a second set of doors with standard locks that would be unlocked either via key from the outside or thumbknob from the inside. Its not that uncommon I guess in buildings of that general time period (in the case of my former church, 1980). I would be surprised though if the business you speak of has a secondary lock in place but doesn't use it. Like you said though, it may be a last person out kind of thing. The crash bar locks should be sufficient to keep people out who wouldn't find another way to break in even with a proper lock.

[boringscreenname]

My former church was like that with the outer set of doors--one door could be opened from the outside with a key, all could be opened from the inside via the crash bar. To make all doors accessible from the outside for a church service (or during office hours for the office door), it was necessary to get the allen key from under the usher's desk, hold the crash bars down to the unlock position, and use the allen key to tighten a bolt under the handle to hold it in unlock position.

This is the way the main doors at my site work. We don't have a second set of locks or doors, but there is always someone sitting at the main desk monitoring the doors, so if someone who's not supposed to be here gets in we know immediately.

[roothorick]

My former church was like that with the outer set of doors--one door could be opened from the outside with a key, all could be opened from the inside via the crash bar. To make all doors accessible from the outside for a church service (or during office hours for the office door), it was necessary to get the allen key from under the usher's desk, hold the crash bars down to the unlock position, and use the allen key to tighten a bolt under the handle to hold it in unlock position. Both the main entrance and the office entrance had a second set of doors with standard locks that would be unlocked either via key from the outside or thumbknob from the inside. Its not that uncommon I guess in buildings of that general time period (in the case of my former church, 1980). I would be surprised though if the business you speak of has a secondary lock in place but doesn't use it. Like you said though, it may be a last person out kind of thing. The crash bar locks should be sufficient to keep people out who wouldn't find another way to break in even with a proper lock.

Many, many, MANY "latchless" commercial doors work like this; they're everywhere. The allen key is the same across pretty much all the doors, but it's useless from the outside; if the crash bar is up, you need the real key to get in. Our main doors at The Gerbil are like this too.

[Skeen]

Wow, that's even worse that at my office, and our first line of defense is a 75-year-old woman.

[Chromatix]

Many doors and access panels on trains are "secured" with a device called a carriage key. In Britain, it's basically a square socket spanner, in Finland it's a triangular one. Anyone with an ounce of determination could make one for themselves.

The driving controls themselves are usually better secured...