It’s time once again to recount a story I overheard regarding a bank somewhere in the United States. The employee was contacted by a customer who was concerned that there was an issue at the bank due to the number of police cars surrounding it. Upon calling the manager, the individual discovered that customers had wandered in and were waiting in line. This is a very normal process for most financial institutions with the exception that it was a federal holiday and that the bank was closed. Yes folks — the bank was closed, the lights were off, there was a big sign on the door and yet people were inside waiting to check on their money.
Just in case you were wondering, security at banks is a really big deal. They have complete departments, third-party organizations as well as certain federal law enforcement agencies whose only focus is on the security of the money in our institutions. For a bank to lose security on their front door and not know about it is a really big deal. Now before you start freaking out you also need to know that the bank door is merely the first security measure to your money. There are often security alarms, camera systems and hardened vaults keeping your money from the bad people.
It was eventually discovered that the cleaning crew had left the door unlocked. This was also the second time that this specific problem had occurred. I’m reminded of the English idiom, “Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.”
How much do you put your trust in other people, places or things?
In most everything we do today there is an assumed security trust in our banks, our computers and even the 16 year old who takes your credit card. We rely on locks to keep our houses safe, fences to secure our animals and even word of mouth to keep secrets. The amount of trust you place in a security object should be directly proportional to amount of integrity that can be assumed about that object. And a measure of integrity is where most trust issues break down.
When I was in the Navy, you had to rely on the guy next to you for just about everything. On a submarine, with more than a thousand feet of cold water over your head, you didn’t have time to worry if your shipmate was being completely truthful about a log entry or maintenance item he did. You had to trust that he had the built-in moral values necessary to tell the truth. For me that is integrity, and those with none were rapidly removed from certain areas and people who could be more consistent in that area were brought in. Our jails are full of people who lack integrity.
My internal measurement of integrity is a bit more than most people today even consider when it comes to integrity and trust. As an example, I never (ever) reply to an email until I’ve done a Google search to ensure that the responses I expect are there. I also never fully read a forwarded article or post unless I ensure there is no associated discussion of it being an urban legend or false rumor. And guess what, every time you send me something that turns out to be easily shown as fake, I perform a mental subtraction on your integrityscore. For me trust and integrity are not assumed they are earned.
With that in mind you should also do more than assume that something or someone has your best interest in mind. Do a background check on that employee or company that you plan on trusting with your security. Read reviews on the software before you install it. Talk to people who use a product that can expose your valuables to others. Social tools are great for uncovering trust and integrity information about people, places and things. Just ensure you trust who is is saying them, or you to can subtract one from their integrity score.
Disclaimer: You should not take advantage of any information that I’ve divulged in hopes of gaining access to a bank. Bad people rob banks; you are not bad.
This article has been Digiproved © 2010
