Published 23 May 2023
What is a Facility Security Assessment Checklist?
A facility security assessment checklist helps a facility security officer (FSO) carry out an extensive internal scan of a facility’s current infrastructure and its vulnerabilities and potential threats. It helps define the necessary solutions to achieve their desired future state of security through a Facility Security Plan (FSP).
Facility Security Assessment Checklist
A facility security assessment checklist is a helpful tool for conducting structured examinations of a physical facility, its assets, vulnerabilities, and threats. This digital checklist can be customized to various types of facilities, such as those for schools, healthcare, libraries, warehouses, medical research, chemical research, and gated residential communities.
Through the SafetyCulture (formerly iAuditor) mobile inspection app, facility security professionals can use this smart checklist to:
- Attach and annotate photos as supporting evidence during document reviews, facility walk-throughs, and interviews
- Generate CEO-ready facility security assessment reports to track the standing of the internal security program
- Easily revise and disseminate checklists when the facility security plan is updated
- Sign off facility assessment checklist with management and other key stakeholders
In this article
- What Should a Facility Security Assessment Checklist Include?
- 4 Critical Steps in Performing Facility Security Assessments
- Improved Facility Security Assessments with SafetyCulture
- Digital Facility Security Assessment Checklist
What Should a Facility Security Assessment Checklist Include?
Because an FSA requires an expansive review of a facility, a checklist would be a helpful guide in ensuring that all details would be checked and no major components would be missed. A comprehensive FSA checklist should contain the following:
- Background/details about the facility
- Risk assessment methods
- Assigned security personnel
- Vulnerabilities found
- Possible security threats
- Response to threats, incidents, and breaches
- Threat assessment
- Security training
- Physical inspections (internal and external)
- CCTV Surveillance
- Alarm systems
- Interviews (manager, employee)
- Other notable observations
4 Critical Steps in Performing Facility Security Assessments
The evolution of technology comes with the transformation of security threats. Criminals discover new mechanisms to break through the most stringent of security systems. Without physical or facility security assessments, building occupants are exposed to threats that can harm their assets and put them at much higher risk.
To ensure the effectiveness of facility or physical security assessments, FSOs should consider these key points in a facility security assessment checklist:
1. Identify current assets and potential risks.
Every facility will have its own infrastructure and vulnerabilities to its security program. A chemical facility possesses its own unique set of threats, as opposed to those of a school building, federal facility, or marine port.
It is important to carefully examine the company’s assets, strengths and weaknesses of building access control systems,and consequences of the security risks associated with the facility. This will help inform the FSO to know which threats are high-priority.
2. Interview occupants of the facility.
The foremost objective of facility security assessments is to protect people; property comes next. It is only practicable to consult inhabitants of the facility to get valuable insights on aspects, such as security policies, building access paths, current protocols, and history of theft incidents. These insights will make it easier for FSOs to devise a security plan that best suits the facility’s occupants.
3. Communicate assessment results to the management.
There should be a medium to directly discuss the security assessment report results with management, as they have the means to allot resources for implementing the FSP. Details that should be included in the report are:
- Date of the facility security assessment
- Types of tests performed
- Summary of security vulnerabilities identified according to priority
- Recommendations and specific steps on how to address the security holes
4. Schedule regular facility security assessments.
Having regular and consistent assessments is critical to remain current with security configurations and systems as technology continually evolve and new threats emerge. Some building administrators find it effective to conduct full facility security assessments annually, while others may prefer twice a year. However, companies can opt to do smaller inspections monthly to prevent potential issues from becoming big security risks.
Improved Facility Security Assessments with SafetyCulture
Facility security managers and officers are vital in making sure that people, facilities, and other assets are protected. With SafetyCulture, the world’s #1 mobile inspection app, security professionals can build smart, intuitive facility security assessment checklists to help them catch loopholes early on and recommend necessary security controls. On top of that, the SafetyCulture facility management software can be used to:
- Involve building personnel to easily capture and report security issues via the SafetyCulture mobile app
- Attach and annotate photos as supporting evidence during document reviews, facility walkthroughs, and interviews
- Manage corrective actions and track their progress with task delegation and automatic notifications
- Generate CEO-ready facility security assessment reports to track the standing of the internal security program
- Achieve compliance to minimum retention period of FSA documents with SafetyCulture’s secure, data cloud storage
- Easily update FSA checklists when the FSP is updated
- Sign off facility assessment checklist with management and other key stakeholders
Digital Facility Security Assessment Checklist
Port Facility Security Assessment (PFSA) Checklist
A port facility security assessment (PFSA) checklist aids port facility security officers (PFSOs) in conducting a risk analysis of all aspects of a port facility’s operation and discerns areas of susceptibility or vulnerability to attacks. It is an essential exercise that helps achieve compliance to the International Ship and Port Facility Security (ISPS) Code.