Aviation security is a critical aspect of the industry, with airports facing much higher levels of security oversight when compared to that of other public facilities. And with domestic leisure travel already exceeding pre-pandemic levels, the number of flights and airport crew traveling between different airports also grows, making physical security in airports an even higher priority. The aviation sector therefore requires a comprehensive approach to physical security, contractor management, and device maintenance.

Automating this approach can help improve overall security by reducing the risk of human error and providing a more efficient response to potential threats. In this blog post, we’ll explore the role of automation in improving physical security, the importance of contractor management, and the benefits of proactive device maintenance.

The Role of Automation in Aviation Security

When discussing the challenges of airport and aviation security, many factors may come to mind: regulatory compliance, staffing shortages, insider and outsider threat attempts, a high number of contracted workers, the need to simultaneously ensure traveler safety and satisfaction, security device management, data integrity, etc. Separately addressing each of these challenges is both ineffective and inefficient. That is why comprehensive data automation solutions have been purpose built to address a number of physical security challenges.

Introducing such solutions into an aviation environment has a number of advantages, perhaps most importantly as it relates to physical security. For example, automated physical identity and access management (PIAM) solutions are designed to analyze all PIAM data (i.e. badges, roles, access assignments, access usage, etc.) from existing business systems including HR software, access history gathered from physical access control systems (PACS), and even data from systems such as Active Directory. Brought together, this data collectively provides enterprise-wide visibility to all identities and their physical access across an entire aviation operation.

For Insider Threats

From a physical security standpoint, the advantages of having a single source of truth for access and identities is two-fold. First, is through the identification of insider threats. Prior to carrying out an attack, insider threats are likely to engage in anomalous activities, such as visiting a site at odd hours, accessing areas they have never visited, and attempting to enter restricted areas where they are not authorized, which may alarm co-workers or security personnel or easily go undetected.

However, the anomalous activities noted above are all recorded and buried in the PIAM data recorded by various business systems. Automated PIAM solutions effectively brings the anomalies to the forefront using machine learning algorithms tuned to inspect various parameters like timestamp, location, door, address, device, transaction patterns, high-risk alarm codes, peer groups, etc. The system monitors for any deviation from an individual’s normal behavior that May be indicative of a threat, allowing for immediate remedial action.

For Greater Accuracy

Automation can also help reduce the risk of human error in a variety of procedures related to physical security. For example, SIDA badging in airports is a monumental task for already overwhelmed airport security administrators. Any mistakes in access and identity verification can have detrimental consequences.  Automated PIAM solutions help administrators manage the full lifecycle of identities relating to physical access and badging by bringing everything together into a single source of truth. In doing so, processes such as physical access provisioning, background checks, compliance enforcement, on-boarding, and off-boarding are automated and free from human error.

Moreover, such solutions also automatically detect poor data hygiene issues such as blank or null records, duplicate records, incorrect formats, wrong encoding, missing values, etc. When it comes time to remediate these issues, automated playbook offers a standard set of procedures to remediate and track successful mitigations from threats. This could mean revoking physical access and/or sending an email/text message asking for identity confirmation. This kind of automation improves data integrity by reducing manual, time-consuming, error-prone, and duplicate data entry in multiple standalone systems while also saving valuable time and resources.

For Regulatory Compliance

PIAM automation tools are ideal for airports searching for better, more effective way to comply with evolving TSA, FAA, and other government mandates. Routine TSA auditing of SIDA badges is not uncommon, with detrimental consequences for non-compliance. In 2016, Congress enacted the FAA Extension, Safety, and Security Act of 2016, which tightened the measures related to airport access control. Under this act, any airport found to have more than 5% of their SIDA badges unaccounted for must effectively rebadge the entire airport. Not only is the rebadging process tedious and time-consuming, but is also costly.

As outlined above, automated PIAM solutions are designed to continuously check actual operational data against policies and historical data patterns. In essence, this approach can be described as a “continual audit”, automatically enforcing and proving compliance to keep any aviation operation “audit ready” at all times. Management can easily review access sorted by person, by area, by approver, or any other relevant factor to answer urgent needs. Reports related to access and identity validations are always ready and can be produced to meet regulatory or investigational needs with little or no notice, saving organizations both time and stress.

Physical security automation in aviation has the potential to improve overall security, efficiency, and compliance. While there are challenges and considerations that need to be addressed, the benefits of automation make it a valuable investment for airports and the aviation industry as a whole. By implementing physical security automation via data-driven PIAM solutions, the aviation industry can ensure the safety and security of passengers, crew members, and the aircrafts themselves.