Leveraging Technology to Strengthen the Security of Correctional Facilities

How prisons can secure their premises and protect inmates and staff with technological solutions?

Prisons everywhere rely on guards, physical locks, and razor wires to secure their premises and protect the people within them. However, the prevalence of jailbreaks, violence, contraband smuggling, and criminal activities show that old-fashioned security measures are both inadequate and ineffective to create truly secure prison premises.

Today’s correctional facilities need modern security technologies that provide visibility into prison premises and perimeters, generate real-time insights about incidents and intruders, and enable officers to act quickly as soon as an incident is detected. When combined with human judgment and wisdom, these new-age systems strengthen prison security and safeguard them from illegal, unsavory, and dangerous incidents.

Must-have Security Technologies for Prisons

Today, correctional facilities and their decision-makers can choose from many solutions to secure their premises and people. These include:

Digital keycards and biometrics-based identity and access management/control

In any correctional facility, it’s important to control prisoner movement and ensure that they remain visible to security personnel. Movement control and visibility can prevent security incidents and keep everyone safe. And for this, reliable access control is crucial.

Compared to physical keys and locks, digital keycards and biometric authentication systems are harder to compromise and therefore provide more reliable access control and much stronger security. Digital and biometric systems can also keep out unauthorized or malicious users, while ensuring convenience and low-friction access for authorized users.

Smart visitor management

Visitors, both official (e.g., government personnel) and non-official (e.g., family of inmates), are a common sight in jails. To maintain security, staff must be able to screen and identify all visitors when they enter and leave the facility. They must also be able to account for all visitors during emergencies. It’s also crucial to ensure that visitors don’t stray into limited- or no-entry areas.

Biometrics-based visitor management systems can help meet all these goals. These systems can be used both to identify known visitors by comparing their details to a database, as well as to authenticate visitors’ identities and determine if they should be allowed to enter the prison premises.

Would you like to know more about how to enhance the security of correctional facilities?