Securing the mail stream
By David Logan, mail and print solutions director, Pitney Bowes Management Services. In the UK, MI5 takes the issue seriously enough to offer practical security guidelines against letter-bombs (including chemical, biological and radioactive threats) on its official website. Quite how many businesses have taken the trouble to view these guidelines remains a moot point. Certainly, the number of organizations that have implemented robust changes to their mail-handling procedures remains small, although momentum in this area is gathering. Anthrax in the mail stream: myths and realities One of the persistent myths about anthrax is that it is a powder that can be seen inside an envelope. “It needs to be thought of less as powder in an envelope and more like perfume in the air,” says Dr. Douglas Quine, an anthrax expert with Pitney Bowes’ Advanced Concepts and Technology studio. “The spores fit very easily through the pores in a paper envelope. Once it’s in a building, even if the powder is contained in a paper envelope, the building is contaminated.” Happily, plastic is one way to contain anthrax. Pitney Bowes is developing a detection system that uses airtight plastic bags as the first line of protection. Bagging the mail is a safe approach for low-volume recipients of mail. If anthrax is detected inside the sealed bag it is contained and can be disposed of properly. But for high volume users, bagging the mail may not be practical. It may be more practical to ‘bag’ the mail handlers instead. Consider an offsite self-contained negative pressure air room to keep the mail quarantined until proven safe. Addressing the threat In fact, the most important factor in mail stream security by far is a well-trained, educated mail handling team. Equipment alone cannot replace an aware, trained, mailroom staff that, working in conjunction with security personnel, is the best protection against an attack on the mailroom. Being able to identify the sender of a particular mail piece is an important safety consideration. None of the anthrax-tainted letters that caused such panic in 2001 carried indicia from a postage meter, because the indicia are traceable and trackable to a specific device. Mailroom personnel should be aware of this and can easily affirm that the mail piece comes from a trusted source. After employee training, the possible counter measures that organizations can implement to improve mailroom security run the gamut from relocating the incoming mail function to isolating it from other departments, to automating the function to reduce the incidence of manual handling, to improving the screening of incoming mail and packages through the use of video, x-ray and even specially trained dogs. Some firms at a higher level of perceived risk are implementing additional safety measures, which include the mandatory use of protective clothing and equipment for personnel, the creation of secure and self-contained work stations for opening mail, and the use of high efficiency vacuums and air filtration systems. For example, in response to the 2001 attacks, which shut down the Congressional postal center, the House of Representatives piloted a digital mail system, which allows first-class mail to be scanned offsite and delivered to members in electronic form in order to reduce the House’s vulnerability through the mail. Keeping the physical mail offsite is an important component in this strategy. The cost of cleaning up an anthrax-contaminated facility is about the same as the cost of tearing down the facility and rebuilding it completely. Clean up at the two postal service facilities that were infected in 2001 cost over $150 million and took two years. In the unlikely event that actual biohazards are present they are contained in a vacuum-sealed room that can be cleaned at a cost far lower than that of cleaning a building. The mail handlers inside are trained professionals that understand the procedures for remediation and know what steps to take to minimize the threat to themselves and the operation. An array of products and technologies are available to help bolster mailroom security. These include the common, such as metered mail and address management software to help verify the origin and authenticity of individual mail pieces; to the advanced, such as e-mail alerts with attached digital images of unexpected packages or the remote opening and digital delivery of messages; to the premium, which can include extreme measures to isolate and contain potential biohazards, as well as the ongoing use of cleansing or biohazard detection devices. Every product or technology related to mailroom security may not be appropriate for or needed by every organization. But every organization needs to strike a balance and take sensible safety precautions. When mail-processing personnel use awareness, common sense, and effective, documented procedures, mail safety and security is possible.
•Date: 8th June 2006 • Region: UK/US/World • Type: Article •Topic: BC general |
