Everbridge report finds that despite increase in awareness and concern around active shooters, half of organizations don't have a communications plan in place, and 62 percent never run drills
More than three quarters of organizations list an active shooter situation as their top safety threat, according to Everbridge, Inc. EVBG, the global leader in critical event management and enterprise safety applications to help keep people safe and businesses running. The 2018 Active Shooter Preparedness Report, compiled by Everbridge in partnership with Security Management magazine, focuses on the level of enterprise preparedness for these increasingly prevalent, and potentially tragic and devastating events. The findings, when compared to Everbridge's inaugural report from 2016, portray a corporate environment with heightened security awareness, which has not, however, translated into tangible preparedness efforts for the majority of organizations.
Heightened Awareness
Seventy-five percent of respondents
listed active shooter situations as the "top threat" they are preparing
for – up from 64 percent in 2016 – and outranking concerns such as
natural disasters, cyberattacks and supply chain disruptions.
Additionally, more than twice as many respondents felt that their
organization was well prepared for an active shooter incident – from 19
percent in 2016 to 40 percent in 2018. More than two-thirds also
reported that their organization was more prepared than two years ago.
Preparedness Deficits
In today's modern threat environment,
organizations are increasingly seeking new tools, processes and
technologies to secure their facilities, locate and account for their
people and ensure life safety for all employees. However, increased
awareness and perceptions of preparedness have not translated to actions
by a majority of businesses during the past two years. For example:
- 62 percent of survey respondents reported never running an active shooter drill
- 54 percent have not conducted active shooter education
- Only 15 percent increased physical security spending
- Only 35 percent plan to increase physical security spending in the future
"Every second matters in an active shooter situation," said Tracy Reinhold, Chief Security Officer of Everbridge. "The findings show that while corporate recognition around the threat of active shooters has improved, the tangible preparedness measures and location-aware communication infrastructure is not in place to improve safety at the majority of companies nationwide. It's imperative that we work together to refine our security-related processes and investments. Physical safety is a critical employee engagement issue that corporate leadership must take seriously by turning their concerns into investments."
Communication Needs to Take Place in Seconds, Not Minutes
The
majority of organizations (70 percent) said that their top concern
during an active shooter event is communicating and confirming the
safety of impacted employees, as the majority of active shooter
situations are over in less than 10 minutes. Eighty percent of employees
prefer that it take seconds for their companies to notify them of an
active shooter situation. Yet when asked how long it would take to
notify employees of an incident, two-thirds of companies thought that
notifications would take minutes.
"These findings directly contradict the idea that organizations are prepared for an active shooter event," continued Reinhold. "While no organization can truly be ready to deal with such a chaotic and challenging situation, ignoring the need to have a reliable system in place to effectively locate and communicate with employees, responders and other local officials – and not practicing an organization-wide response to such a situation – proves that improvements can still be made. Moreover, the prevalence and purported elevated concerns around these threats emphasizes the need for corporate leadership and executive teams to more emphatically support the investments and process changes required to ensure employee safety and operational resiliency."
The 2018 Active Shooter Preparedness Report is based on surveyed responses from over 630 security, facilities, business continuity and emergency management professionals. The survey took place in the fourth quarter of 2018. To download a copy of the 2018 Active Shooter Preparedness Report, please click here.
About Everbridge
Everbridge,
Inc. EVBG is a global software company that provides
enterprise software applications that automate and accelerate
organizations' operational response to critical events in order to keep
people safe and businesses running. During public safety threats such as
active shooter situations, terrorist attacks or severe weather
conditions, as well as critical business events including IT outages,
cyber-attacks or other incidents such as product recalls or supply-chain
interruptions, over 4,400 global customers rely on the company's
Critical Event Management Platform to quickly and reliably aggregate and
assess threat data, locate people at risk and responders able to assist,
automate the execution of pre-defined communications processes through
the secure delivery to over 100 different communication devices, and
track progress on executing response plans. The company's platform sent
over 2.8 billion messages in 2018 and offers the ability to reach over
500 million people in more than 200 countries and territories, including
the entire mobile populations on a country-wide scale in Sweden, the
Netherlands, the Bahamas, Singapore, Greece, Cambodia, and a number of
the largest states in India. The company's critical communications and
enterprise safety applications include Mass Notification, Incident
Management, Safety Connection™, IT Alerting, Visual Command Center®,
Crisis Commander®, Community Engagement™ and Secure Messaging.
Everbridge serves 9 of the 10 largest U.S. cities, 9 of the 10 largest
U.S.-based investment banks, all 25 of the 25 busiest North American
airports, six of the 10 largest global consulting firms, six of the 10
largest global auto makers, all four of the largest global accounting
firms, four of the 10 largest U.S.-based health care providers and four
of the 10 largest U.S.-based health insurers. Everbridge is based in
Boston and Los Angeles with additional offices in Lansing, San
Francisco, Beijing, Bangalore, Kolkata, London, Munich, Oslo, Stockholm
and Tilburg. For more information, visit www.everbridge.com,
read the company blog,
and follow on Twitter and Facebook.
Cautionary Language Concerning Forward-Looking Statements
This
press release contains "forward-looking statements" within the meaning
of the "safe harbor" provisions of the Private Securities Litigation
Reform Act of 1995, including but not limited to, statements regarding
the anticipated opportunity and trends for growth in our critical
communications and enterprise safety applications and our overall
business, our market opportunity, our expectations regarding sales of
our products, and our goal to maintain market leadership and extend the
markets in which we compete for customers. These forward-looking
statements are made as of the date of this press release and were based
on current expectations, estimates, forecasts and projections as well as
the beliefs and assumptions of management. Words such as "expect,"
"anticipate," "should," "believe," "target," "project," "goals,"
"estimate," "potential," "predict," "may," "will," "could," "intend,"
variations of these terms or the negative of these terms and similar
expressions are intended to identify these forward-looking statements.
Forward-looking statements are subject to a number of risks and
uncertainties, many of which involve factors or circumstances that are
beyond our control. Our actual results could differ materially from
those stated or implied in forward-looking statements due to a number of
factors, including but not limited to: the ability of our products and
services to perform as intended and meet our customers' expectations;
our ability to attract new customers and retain and increase sales to
existing customers; our ability to increase sales of our Mass
Notification application and/or ability to increase sales of our other
applications; developments in the market for targeted and contextually
relevant critical communications or the associated regulatory
environment; our estimates of market opportunity and forecasts of market
growth may prove to be inaccurate; we have not been profitable on a
consistent basis historically and may not achieve or maintain
profitability in the future; the lengthy and unpredictable sales cycles
for new customers; nature of our business exposes us to inherent
liability risks; our ability to attract, integrate and retain qualified
personnel; our ability to successfully integrate businesses and assets
that we may acquire; our ability to maintain successful relationships
with our channel partners and technology partners; our ability to manage
our growth effectively; our ability to respond to competitive pressures;
potential liability related to privacy and security of personally
identifiable information; our ability to protect our intellectual
property rights, and the other risks detailed in our risk factors
discussed in filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission
("SEC"), including but not limited to our Annual Report on Form 10-K for
the year ended December 31, 2017 filed with the SEC on March 12, 2018.
The forward-looking statements included in this press release represent
our views as of the date of this press release. We undertake no
intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking
statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or
otherwise. These forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as
representing our views as of any date subsequent to the date of this
press release.
All Everbridge products are trademarks of Everbridge, Inc. in the USA and other countries. All other product or company names mentioned are the property of their respective owners.
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