Force 5
Beyond the Standard Front Desk

As technology continues to evolve in today’s world, so do the controls to protect it. Physical security continues to be a challenge in the power utility industry. The NERC CIP Reliability Standards are shaping how the industry protects the Bulk Electric System, and the number of utility companies that must adhere to these standards is growing daily. At present, utility companies that have BES Cyber Assets which have a high or medium impact rating must secure those systems behind a Physical Security Perimeter (PSP). Anyone who does not have unescorted physical access to those areas must be accompanied by a valid escort and be fully documented. Unfortunately, most utility companies rely on manual processes to accomplish this task, often resulting in Possible Violations (PV) due to human error.

Offering Unique Visitor Management Solutions for the Power Utility Industry

Most visitor management solutions in the industry today focus on checking in guests at the front desk. They offer easy guest logging while boasting improved efficiency throughout your organization. However, the effectiveness only exists within the corporate lobby environment, falling short of encompassing other critical sites found in power utilities, such as NERC CIP PSPs and OSHA Point- Of-Entries. These solutions do not transcend to those protected areas. “Lack of technical controls and the proliferation of manual processes are leading to higher impact and greater likelihood of compliance violations” states Mike Almeyda, Account Manager - Security and Compliance Offerings at Force 5, Inc. “As a former SERC CIP Auditor and Power Utility Compliance Manager, I can tell you from experience that the guaranteed way to reduce this type of inherent risk exposure is through implementing human performance shaping tools.” Many power utility companies have a standard visitor management solution at the front desk, but resort back to manual processes at their most critical sites. No company in the industry seems to have an answer to this problem— except Force 5.

Founded in 2000, this Miami-based firm offers unique Visitor Management Solutions for the power utility industry—designed to provide audit-ready evidence, constant situational awareness, actionable point of enforcement and persistent risk assessment. Force 5’s Gatekeeper is a single unified platform built to meet the needs of power utilities. It boasts four robust components designed specifically for the rigors of the power utility industry. Gatekeeper Front Desk, the first component of the solution, facilitates point of entry and secured area visitor management within a corporate environment. It provides expedited logging and a streamlined platform for security personnel/front desk receptionists to quickly log in visitors or enroll first-time visitors. Gatekeeper CIP enForce, the next component, takes visitor management to the next level. Built specifically to meet CIP regulatory compliance requirements, this module implements an escort-centric workflow that combines physical access logging with identity management and validation. This solution ensures that individuals identified as authorized escorts have the proper credentials in accordance with the NERC CIP Reliability Standards and captures the appropriate visit data required by CIP-006.

The Next Generation of Plant Perimeter Monitoring

Its third module, Gatekeeper Key Management, enables organizations to securely manage their physical keys.Access to keys is granted with self-service kiosks and automated locking mechanisms, while the use of keys is documented securely in Gatekeeper. It provides a complete history and audit trail of each object used. The final module, Gatekeeper Perimeter enForce Buildings (PEB), is the next generation of plant perimeter monitoring. Gatekeeper PEBs provide a portable packaged solution for perimeter regulatory compliance, using physical identifiers, control turnstiles, and module containers to ensure adherence to safety regulations such as OSHA 1910.269.

Meeting the Collective Needs of Multiple Business Units

In summary, Gatekeeper is a revolutionary enterprise visitor management solution that enhances compliance-based evidence and forensics needed for risk analysis and audit-ready reporting. It promotes seamless integration across the enterprise, providing situational awareness through near real-time dashboard monitoring and alerting across various business units like generation, transmission, and distribution, just to name a few. “Gatekeeper is a true enterprise-level visitor management solution, providing reporting tools which produce audit-ready evidence and forensics, meeting the collective needs of multiple business units in power utility companies. You will not find this solution anywhere else in the marketplace,” adds Almeyda.This solution helps power utility companies sustain regulatory compliance while mitigating operational risk. It eliminates the error-prone practice of manual logging and provides improved situational awareness through dashboard monitoring, alerting, electronic logging, and ad-hoc reporting. Gatekeeper, simply put, was built by power utilities for power utilities.