During Steve's virtually live update on Facebook's outage, he mentioned an NYT report that the Facebook engineers couldn't either get in the building or the server rooms to fix the issue because the physical access controls were cloud based. My one claim to fame is being an expert in physical access controls, card readers, locks and back ends.
Any electronic locking system in the US must be subservient to the fire alarm. In simple terms, just pull a fire alarm and all doors on that floor will unlock. FYI fire systems in large buildings must be tested once or twice a year. The item that is tested just after the sounds and flashes is that the doors unlock.
The question is; did Facebook not wire their systems that way (in violation of national building code "for security"), or after six hours someone had an Ah-Ha moment?
Any electronic locking system in the US must be subservient to the fire alarm. In simple terms, just pull a fire alarm and all doors on that floor will unlock. FYI fire systems in large buildings must be tested once or twice a year. The item that is tested just after the sounds and flashes is that the doors unlock.
The question is; did Facebook not wire their systems that way (in violation of national building code "for security"), or after six hours someone had an Ah-Ha moment?
