Airport security urged to speed up perimeter response

Recent airport perimeter breaches show airfield security teams are not intercepting trespassers quickly enough, according to Optic Security Group, which cited incidents in Canada and Australia as evidence of a wider problem.

At Vancouver International Airport, police took an individual into custody after he scaled a perimeter fence and accessed an aircraft without authorisation. An airport spokesperson said the fenceline was monitored and the threat was detected and contained within minutes, although it took almost three hours to arrest him.

The incident follows a series of perimeter breaches that have sharpened focus on airside security. In Australia, the federal government has been reviewing airport security settings after several breaches, including one at Avalon Airport in which a teenager used a hole in the fence to reach a Jetstar aircraft.

Nicholas Dynon, Optic Security Group's Group Brand Strategy & Innovation Director, said such events should not be seen as unusual.

"Globally, perimeter breaches occur with enough frequency-typically dozens per year-that they should be treated as an expected risk condition rather than an exceptional event," he said.

The key issue, he argued, is how much time security teams have between an intrusion attempt and access to sensitive parts of an airport.

"The differentiator between a minor incident and a major safety event is the airport's ability to detect, verify and respond before the intruder reaches critical airside infrastructure," Dynon said. "It comes down to a simple principle: speed of detection and response must be faster than the time it takes a trespasser to scale or cut their way through perimeter fencing."

Scale problem

Airports face a basic challenge because their sites are large and perimeter fences can run for more than 10km. That leaves long stretches to monitor and defend, while security teams must cover significant ground to intercept an intruder.

Dynon said patrols, whether by staff on the ground or by drone, cannot provide continuous surveillance across an entire perimeter. He also argued that cable-based fence sensors do not give a clear enough picture of a threat, while CCTV over long distances creates infrastructure challenges.

"This is a time and space problem that's clearly thwarting traditional designs," he said.

In his view, airport security planning should begin with the assumption that long perimeter fences will be tested and, in some cases, breached, and that response teams will need several minutes to reach the point of entry.

On that basis, he said, perimeter fencing must slow an intruder long enough for security systems to detect and verify a breach and direct a response team before the person reaches the airfield.

AI argument

Optic argues that artificial intelligence-based analytics can shorten the time needed to identify and verify a threat by combining information from multiple sensors. Dynon described an approach that brings together inputs from CCTV, radar, thermal systems and fence vibration sensors to create a more reliable picture of a monitored area.

"If an airport's perimeter security system is not harnessing Artificial Intelligence-based advanced analytics for automated threat detection and verification then it will not perform quickly enough to prevent a motivated trespasser from stepping foot on the airfield," Dynon said.

He added that combining different data sources could help security teams track a trespasser's movements and guide responders in real time.

"Properly harnessed, artificial intelligence provides airports with an unprecedented ability to collapse time and space at the perimeter and regain control of their airfields.

"Where AI technology gets you ahead of a trespasser is its ability to combine data from multiple sensors (CCTV, radar, thermal, fence vibration, etc) to produce a reliable view of a surveilled area, detect a potential threat and verify it, track its movements, and direct a security response team to it in real time before the threat becomes an issue.

"It's a race between trespasser and security for which there's no prize for second place," he said.

Dynon previously served for 14 years with the Australian Department of Immigration & Border Protection, now Home Affairs. He is also a licensed security consultant with professional certifications in security risk and counter-terrorism practice.

Recent breaches have intensified scrutiny of whether airports can detect and stop intruders quickly enough once fencing has been climbed, cut or otherwise bypassed.