In recent years, “Digital Transformation” initiatives have taken priority across industries. But an article last month in Industry Week cited the “deskless workforce” as the last holdout of digital transformation: and it’s not small. The article estimates that about 80% of the world’s workforce, or 2.7 billion workers, have been “left behind” by digital transformation: that is, the introduction of new technologies intended to enhance “safety, quality, and productivity” for companies.

So how can physical security, arguably one of the most important “deskless” roles throughout our society, be positively impacted by a digital transformation of its own?  

The Reasons to Transform: What’s Missing? 

Thru the years we have certainly witnessed developments in technologies for physical security. The introduction of video management systems, communications devices, and physical access systems (ticketing, badging, biometrics) have all added advancements to the industry.  

But when it comes to detecting weapons, perhaps one of the most critical roles in ensuring physical security, many venues still rely on analog metal detectors. And we are all familiar with how that works: stop while you wait in a slow-moving line. Stop to empty your pockets. Stop to hand over your bag. Then, either get waved through or sent back because you’ve forgotten to put down some metal object you were carrying. Stop to get wanded; or, worse yet, submit to a pat-down.  

This process is more than an annoyance. It may amount to a threat itself. Crowds have proven to increasingly become “soft targets” for mass casualty events—as in tragic events at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, and the Boston Marathon bombing. What’s more, the health threats of close-contact crowds have been brought into sharp focus by Covid 19.  

Beyond crowded conditions, metal detectors can also overwhelm the guard resource, causing them to miss real threats in all the clutter they see on a daily basis. The reason lines are so slow-moving, of course, is that we all carry metal items with us every day.   

Metal detectors pass the work of distinguishing metal items from true threats off to guards. They simply alarm on everything, not just weapons, so guards are very used to so-called “nuisance alarms” and therefore, rightly so, don’t trust the system. That means they are left doing the brunt of the work—visually checking each person and bag that alarms. Most of the time, all they find is everyday items: laptops, tablets, smart phones, keys, etc. But this creates fatigue, because it’s easy to overlook what you don’t expect to see, and can result in security teams inadvertently letting weapons through.  

To combat fatigue or to move lines through more quickly, venues may turn off security systems when crowds get overwhelming; they may randomly sample visitors; or, they may opt for no security systems at all—each of which further raises the risk of weapons simply walking through undetected.  

The Way to Transform: What Can Technology Help Do? 

Prioritize the customer experience: The digital transformation of physical security must prioritize guest experience. If the high alarm rate is not indicative of the true number of threats entering a venue –– then a lower alarm rate reflecting the reality that most people are, in fact, not a threat will simultaneously elevate the guest experience and help security teams better pinpoint the true risks at a venue’s entryways. Allowing guests to enter at walking pace, with no interference whatsoever in the experience of visitors who don’t pose a potential threat, provides the best possible user experience both for guests and for guards.  

Let technology do what it does best… and, by extension, let people do what they do best. Technology that can detect weapons – not just metal –to by using AI and advanced sensors to distinguish true threats from everyday items relieves the burden on guards to check people that likely aren’t carrying weapons. And, it can pinpoint for guards where on a person the weapon is expected to be found. This expedites alarm resolution and improves guard efficiency by targeting only visitors who need to be checked and focusing guards only on the locations on their person or baggage to check.  

Ensure data drives decisions. Technology at the threshold of every visitor and/or employee entrance surpasses the ability of metal detectors by counting visitors, recording alarm rates and types, understanding the dates and times when rates are highest or lowest, and even allowing for the comparison of different security outcomes based on different event types. All this data provides venue security and operations teams with real-world evidence for better decision making, to meet the security and experience needs of their guests, better than guesses, gut feel, or manual counting can. Security planning and venue operations can all be data-driven to ensure the right staffing decisions are made at the right locations throughout the venue to both secure guests and elevate the guest – and guard – experience.  

Connect and communicate. With such a critical mission and so many possible security technologies also operating in the space, security technologies should never exist in a vacuum. Rather, they should integrate seamlessly together with other technologies that make up the extended security ecosystem. Options for integrated camera technologies and integrated communications provide an extension of existing security systems and staff to one of the most vital parts of the venue—its entryways. Neither should security technology require expertise that is outside the scope of existing venue resources. Technology should inherently scale—through built-in connectivity that doesn’t require an IT team to install, connect, or service—and through simple, app-like user experiences that guard staff and security leadership alike can quickly learn to operate, reducing the learning curve and training new staff members ASAP.  

Make life better. Why digitally transform if the technology doesn’t make life better for guests, guard staff, and venue leadership? When guests don’t notice security technology, they are less aggravated, with fewer frustrations to take out on guard staff, and they find the venue even more delightful. If guard staff are made more effective and efficient, they can experience higher job satisfaction and lower turnover rates. For venues, offering better customer experience plus enhanced security while reducing employee turnover are just a few of the potential benefits. Better resource use through data-driven decisions, better use of entryway space with fewer security lines and less equipment overall, and the chance to redeploy guard staff to different roles throughout the venue are all further benefits that venues can realize.  

The Imperative to Transform 

Of course, not least of all is the benefit of increased safety to the visitors of venues around the world that choose to embrace the digital transformation of their physical security. Simply put, shorter security lines through more reliable screening technology adds up to safer visitors—and lower false alarm rates mean guards can more easily pinpoint and stop bad actors—making more venues where people and their families love to gather with one another in our community safer.  

Each year, Security Today presents awards for the best new products across a variety of categories. The winners are chosen by an independent group of experts. For 2021, I am proud to say, Evolv has been named as the 2021 New Product of the Year in the Pedestrian Security Entrances category. 

This is yet another important industry-wide recognition of our mission to create a safer world and set a new standard for physical security in the 21st century. Evolv Express® is the first and only weapons detection security screening system powered by advanced sensors and artificial intelligence to deliver a safer, fast, and friction-free experience for patrons. 

When you think about the category in which we were selected, Pedestrian Security Entrances, the first images that probably come to mind are metal detectors—and the long lines and laborious processes of patrons pulling out their phones, emptying their pockets, and walking one at a time through a threshold that is obtrusive and not at all welcoming. As we still grapple with a global pandemic, these images seem not only incongruous and out of touch; they’re frankly a security threat. 

Unfortunately, this outdated 20th-century metal detection technology has been the standard for Pedestrian Security Entrances for a long time—not because it is particularly effective, but because developing a better, modern replacement based on advanced software and digital technology has not been an easy task.  And being able to meet the standards of the professionals we work with using artificial intelligence and advanced sensors to detect weapons, took herculean efforts. The product works. That’s easy to say but difficult to back. We can. 

And now, more than ever, we need it. There were 452 mass shootings in the U.S. to date in 2021, according to the gun violence archive, surpassing 417 in all of 2019.  More venues and employers that never considered security screening technology are looking for solutions.  Airport and prison security is not the answer for the performing arts, casinos, schools, tourist sites, and places of worship.   

We’ve done the work, put in the time, collaborated with the best security professionals in the business (our customers) and we have built and delivered a new standard for weapons detection in the digital age. Not only can visitors walk right through at the pace of life, but they are better protected, and security professionals can redeploy their efforts to more pressing security concerns vs invasive bag checks.  

It is an honor to see our work and our vision capture the attention of industry leaders such as Security Today and its readers. As Security Today noted, their New Product of the Year Award “honors the outstanding product development achievements of the security equipment manufacturers whose products are considered to be particularly noteworthy in their ability to improve security.” 

Congratulations are in order to our dedicated team of engineers, who live their mission daily by transforming security to enhance everyone’s life. One more notable step on our journey to make the world a safer place to live, work, and play.   

As the world reopens, physical security is top of mind for venue leadership and visitors alike. Venue security relies on a combination of people, processes, and technologies to prevent harmful weapons from entering. Different venues take different approaches to creating, maintaining, and improving security screening based on the unique needs of the organization and its visitors.  

But every venue has a common challenge: ensure a welcoming guest experience while preventing potential weapons threats from entering. To help address this need in the many ways venues implement security, Evolv recently launched its latest software update for Evolv Express®, Version 3.0. This version introduces new capabilities to advance threat detection, enhance existing venue security response time and protocols with integrated communications, and improve usability and mobility with an intuitive user experience and a wireless tablet option.  

Changing the Status Quo 

Balancing guest experience with the mandate to keep everyone safe is critical when making decisions about security personnel, processes, and technologies. While metal detectors are extremely good at alarming on any object that could be a threat, their user experience is less than ideal. They require people to separate from their bags and personal items, which result in repeat scans, and creates long lines. And in this post-pandemic era, requiring guards to handle personal items, or even wand and pat-down guests, can result in potentially unsafe personal contact. Certainly not the personal experience we all seek. 

In short, manually assessing everyone entering a venue is a burden on everyone involved, aggravating the very people that venues are trying to welcome in. Worse still, it creates new threats. Beyond just the health concerns of crowded lines and close personal contact, guards can become fatigued with manual checks due to so many false-positive alarms, putting them at higher risk of letting potential threats through. And long, tedious lines in unsecured areas create crowds that could become a soft target themselves: exacerbating the very threat conditions that venues are trying to avoid.  

Better Detection Improves Safety 

Balancing venue security with guest experience should never be a compromise. Evolv Express accelerates the way guests move through security checkpoints by leveraging advanced sensors, artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms, and camera technology to detect and visually pinpoint a potential weapon on a person’s body or baggage. It allows visitors to flow seamlessly into a venue at a normal walking pace while focusing guards’ efforts on quickly and efficiently resolving potential threats.  

The Evolv Express technology continuously improves with new releases, and the 3.0 release introduces yet another update to the detection algorithm. This update helps to refine false positive rates (“nuisance alarms”) without compromising the system’s ability to detect even the smallest weapons. 

Security Ecosystem Integrations Shorten Response Time 

Evolv Express is designed to integrate seamlessly with other venue technologies to ensure security teams are supported in their work using processes and protocols already in place. Unlike analog machines and manual methods, Evolv Express is designed to extend a venue’s security eyes and ears to the entryways with features like front-and-rear-facing cameras with available integrations into an existing Security Operations Center (SOC) or Video Management System (VMS).  

To these existing integration capabilities, Evolv Express Version 3.0 adds the newly-released “Request Assistance” feature. When a guard at an Evolv Express system needs to reach out across the existing extended security ecosystem—whether it’s for help from other team members, supervisors, or adjacent teams like law enforcement—Request Assistance adds a one-touch feature on the Evolv Express tablet that leverages your existing security processes and systems to send communications discreetly and instantaneously via SMS text or email. It automatically includes the location of the system requesting assistance, along with the option for a customized message from the team member in need.  

Request Assistance is easily configured in the MyEvolv portal by a system administrator to ensure that personnel staffing critical positions at a venue will be able to leverage existing security protocols for critical communications to get the help they need and better secure entryways, and guests, quickly.  

Usability Accelerates Threat Resolution 

Each Evolv Express tablet provides a targeted search capability when a potential threat is detected via an indicator on an image of the alerting individual, which shows the location of the threat from different vantage points and allows for the detection of multiple threats on the person or their baggage as they walk through the system. This visual alert only targets individuals with potential threats on their person—not everybody walking through—to streamline the work of your security personnel, allowing them to focus their efforts only on addressing and resolving potential threats.  

Visual alerts are delivered via a tablet user experience, and Evolv Express 3.0 introduces wireless tablets to add new options for system setup and ease of deployment. Wireless tablets create easier set-up and tear-down, increasing system mobility while improving the visual profile of the entryway. They also add new options for the physical configuration of systems, with easy ways to pair additional tablets when needed as visitor flow rates increase. Plus, an updated user experience on wired and wireless tablets for Evolv Express 3.0 modernizes the look-and-feel of the interface.  

Advancing Security with Each New Release 

In addition to continual improvements to threat detection, new integrations with adjacent security technologies, and an enhanced user experience, Evolv Express includes access to the web-based MyEvolv portal and Evolv Insights™ analytics. Insights automatically collects and surfaces metrics related to visitor arrival curves and alarm rates by location, date, and time all in one unified dashboard. By leveraging analytics to improve planning—along with new advancements in threat detection, integrated communications, and usability in Evolv Express 3.0— venues can transform the way they protect visitors from potential security threats.

Would you rely on a standard developed in the 1970s for gas-powered cars as the basis for operating a modern electric car? How about a 1970s standard for land lines to manage your smart phone? Seems pretty ridiculous to rely on decades-old standards to define, inform and keep up with today’s pace of innovation and the varied ways technology has shaped lives over the past 10 years, let alone the past 50. 

Yet, when it comes to our safety when we gather in groups in public places, the only “standards” our industry has available to measure the effectiveness of our security technology was developed in the 1970s for uses that just don’t apply in today’s world and for today’s threats. Not only that but these standards are also based on old analog technology—walk through metal detectors—that are even older than the standards themselves and are incapable of meeting today’s needs for modern weapons detection.  

So, you see why I put the word “standards” in quotation marks. In reality, there has never been a security and safety standard that was designed specifically to meet the needs of today’s modern venue—able to specifically and accurately detect weapons while delivering a free-flow, touchless and friction-free experience to visitors, employees, and other patrons. There weren’t many 80,000 seat stadiums in the early 1900s when metal detectors were first deployed. For decades, security professionals have been hindered by static, outdated technology as they try to react to a new threat environment in today’s dynamic world. 

Until now, of course.   

Today’s standard for physical safety and security must address an era in which soft targets, weapons proliferation, and a global pandemic have dramatically and permanently changed the security landscape. A modern solution must detect weapons, not just metal. It must go beyond security—meeting the concerns and expectations of visitors for a touchless, seamless experience, whether attending a sporting event, concert, mall, school, workplace, or any other places where people gather. 

Eight years ago, when we started Evolv, it was clear that the tools organizations were using for security and safety at their points of entry were obsolete at best, and dangerous at worst. Metal detectors were originally designed primarily for applications such as courts and prisons to prevent a small number of visitors from walking in with small contraband, such as razors or pocketknives.   

The standards developed in the 1970s were based on this old technology and established by the National Institute of Justice for courts and jails, and then adapted by the US FAA, Transportation Security Administration, and other regulators for aviation security. There were no cell phones in the ’70s, no proliferation of assault weapons, no steady drumbeat of gun-related violence.  

Relying on those standards and that technology just doesn’t meet today’s security needs. It forces people to queue in long lines, which creates another potential target for attackers. It forces them to hand their personal belongings to strangers, which is anathema to a safe and pleasant experience with COVID now a daily part of our lives. Worse, the standards are designed to detect metal, not weapons, which requires everyone to dump their pockets and virtually every bag to be searched. Because they weren’t willing to create a line around the block, many organizations avoided using metal detectors and just relied on a visible guard presence, handbag checks by security personnel or, often, no security at all.  

A new standard for detecting weapons at modern venues is needed and was one of the reasons we started Evolv. As I say perhaps far too often, some things have to be believed in order to be seen. We believed we could build a new system that could discriminate weapons from the innocuous everyday objects we all carry while allowing the free flow of people. We could see a new standard because we believed it could be built and, in fact, we could be the ones to build it. 

Evolv Express® is the culmination of years of hard work to develop what I consider to be “wicked smaht” (pronounced in a Boston accent) software, leveraging technology advances that would have seemed like science fiction back in the 1970s. These include advanced video analytics, machine learning, artificial intelligence, sensors, and more.  

It has taken us the better part of six years to perfect the technology. With the help of our early customers and our talented team, the Express is the product that fulfills the original vision we had for Evolv. Our system sets a new standard for physical security because it delivers what venues need, now and into the future, including: 

• Digital technology hardware and software systems that replace obsolete metal detectors with modern weapons detectors. 

• Free-flow, frictionless screening, with a touch-free experience for patrons in a post-COVID environment. 

• Simplified deployment, management, upgrades, and operations. 

• The opportunity for organizations and security leaders to improve security, increase safety, deliver a great user experience and significantly reduce security costs—all at the same time.  

The world is a very different place than it was in the 1970s when the existing “standards” for physical security were adopted. A new standard is needed to adapt to this new world and the current threat environment. We believe the Evolv Express is the next industry standard. Why? Because it fulfills our core mission of making the world safer.  

Helping Evolv become a public company has been an incredible, and humbling experience. Our customers, employees, advisors, and investors have been wonderfully unified behind our mission of making the world a safer place, and we are truly thankful for their support. Building momentum through an unpredictable pandemic has been a wild ride, but we’ve come through it stronger than ever. Now that our transformation into EVLV on the NASDAQ is complete, it’s a good time to look to the future. 

While becoming a public company is a noteworthy milestone for all our stakeholders, the stakeholders I am most focused on are the millions of innocent people rushing back into their favorite venues, unaware that they’re surrounded by concealed weapons. Compelling new data and the lived experiences of our customers have convinced me that the threat profile is spiking in ways that few people fully realize and even fewer are equipped to address. As security professionals, we need to start thinking differently about the threat and work together to address it. 

Take Me Out to The Ballgame, but Don’t Touch Me. 

After 16 months of pandemic anxiety, travel restrictions, lockdowns, social distancing, and masking, the vaccinated population is justifiably feeling entitled to return to all their favorite gathering places. Most people are emerging from the pandemic fog with excitement, but many still harbor significant anxiety about being in crowds or having physical contact with? strangers. The professionals who run facilities and venues are understandably thrilled to welcome back their visitors, but it must be done in a way that recognizes the long-lasting—and possibly permanent—changes in visitor expectations. Going back to densely crowded, hands-on security screening is not what anyone wants in the post-pandemic world. 

There are More Guns than You Think  

It’s no secret that there are a lot of guns out there, but many people don’t realize that they likely encounter multiple concealed guns every day without realizing it. Based on industry data, we estimate that there are over 440 million civilian-owned guns per person in the U.S. That’s around 1.3 guns for every person in the country. About 42% of U.S. households own at least one gun and few guns are kept exclusively at home. A quarter of Americans say they carry a gun at least sometimes and nearly a fifth, 18%, claim to carry every day. And no, it’s not just a red state thing: 28% of people in the Northeast say they carry a gun at least some of the time. 

Civilian Firearms in the United Statesbased on Evolv analysis of datafromSmall Arms Survey 2018andSmall ArmsAnalytics2018-2021.

Another fact that might surprise you is that the United States is not the only country where civilian-owned guns are common. According to Small Arms Survey research, there are 85 countries with 10 or more civilian-owned guns per 100 population. The list includes Germany, France, Italy, Belgium, Australia, New Zealand, and many other countries you might not expect. There are almost half a billion civilian-owned guns outside the United States, and while mass public shootings may feel less common in other countries, the list of tragic incidents outside the U.S. is not short.

Map of civilian guns per 100 people by country from theSmall Arms Survey 2017.

Guns are in the Building 

Nearly every privately-owned facility and venue prohibits dangerous weapons, but the inconvenient truth is that many weapons slip through. How do I know this? Because most of our customers tell us that when they start using our Evolv Express® weapons detection screening, they find a shocking number of guns—far more than they expected and more than they ever found using procedures based on old technology such as metal detectors. I know of one facility in the U.S. that found 57 concealed guns in their first hour of testing Evolv Express at a single entrance. And no, it wasn’t a gun show or a law enforcement convention. It was a place where any average American family might find themselves on any given day of the week.  

The stark reality is that old metal detector screening procedures fail to catch a lot of guns. That’s not to say metal detectors don’t work—it’s the combined system of people, process, and technology that fails. Metal detectors alarm on so many harmless objects that security staff divert all bags and pocket contents into slow, error-prone manual searches. Working under the angry stares of hundreds of frustrated visitors, security staff are under incredible pressure to keep things moving. The guns slip through. 

A Fraying Society is a Dangerous Society 

The likelihood of tragic violence increases when more guns are in the hands of people who are unusually anxious or fearful. New gun purchases were up 64% last year in the United States. The CDC says 40% of U.S. adults reported recent battles with mental health or substance abuse during 2020, with the prevalence of anxiety up 3X and depression up 4X year on year. And ongoing political polarization and extremist ideologies are creating an increasingly volatile situation.  

More guns in more anxious hands means more tragic incidents. It’s just math, but that’s the reality of where we are as a society. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security summarized the situation in a 30 June law enforcement bulletin as follows: 

“In recent weeks, domestic violent extremists (DVEs) motivated by various violent ideologies have continued to advocate violence and plan attacks. As of 16 June, racially or ethnically motivated violent extremist-white supremacists (RMVE-WSs) were sharing downloadable links to a publication discussing targeting mass gatherings, critical infrastructure, and law enforcement officers.”

It’s not just a handful of extremists who are changing the threat landscape. While only a tiny minority of gun owners are infected with the extremist ideologies that the DHS is tracking, the fact remains that many of people around us every day are feeling threatened enough to arm themselves. This increases the risk of tragic escalations where misunderstandings and opportunistic conflict can quickly erupt into violence. 

The Duty of Care to Keep People Safe 

The police recently arrested a man who tried to enter a major tourist destination with an unlicensed gun that was detected by Evolv Express. When questioned, the man explained that he felt threatened by recent public protests and felt he needed the gun to protect his family on vacation, and was willing to take the risk of detection. That’s where we are. The strength of the “visible deterrent” factor is fading fast. Facilities and venues need to start reliably detecting and stopping guns, and then let the public know they have this capability. It’s the only way to reclaim the lost ground, and it needs to happen soon. 

If anxious gun owners are trying to slip into major tourist destinations with guns even when they know it is illegal and can clearly see security screening in place, it is safe to assume that they are also entering schools, grocery stores, malls, houses of worship, and other facilities where weapons are also prohibited, but screening is largely absent. The threat is everywhere.  

As noted earlier, our customers tell us they find a surprising number of weapons with Evolv Express. They also tell us they love that they find more guns while allowing harmless visitors to enter ten times faster than their old screening process based on metal detectors and universal bag checks. They tell us they need fewer front-line security staff overall with Evolv Express, and the remaining staff loves the new process. They also tell us they love the operational awareness they get from Express Insights™ analytics. We hear this same story across hundreds of sites as we scan over 11 million individual visitors every month.  

At this point, I believe it has become abundantly clear that Evolv Express has set a new and higher standard for what security screening should be.  I believe every facility and venue owner has a duty of care to carefully consider the new standard that our weapons detection system represents in light of the escalating threats we’re seeing. We are committed to democratizing access to this technology over time so it can be everywhere it needs to be to keep the vulnerable masses safe.  

If you want to be part of raising the standard of safety for millions of people, we’d love to have your support. Here are a few ideas on how you can help. If you are responsible for security at a facility or venue, please get in touch so we can discuss your needs. Consider speaking with the security staff at the places you gather most often and ask them if they have considered weapons detection. If you’ve experienced the speed and precision of Evolv Express in person, help us tell the world about it. And if you are looking to get more directly involved, note that we’re hiring in almost every department. Together we can all do a little to make everywhere safer.  

What if we lived in a world where we could work, learn and play together without the fear of weapons violence? This is what our founders Mike Ellenbogen, Co-Founder and Head of Technology, and Anil Chitkara, Co-Founder and Head of Corporate Development have set out to do. All of us at Evolv Technology share that same mission; transform security to enhance everyone’s life. This is our duty-of-care and we hold ourselves accountable to it. 

As of today, six months into 2021, there have been 319 mass shootings, compared to 417 in all of 2019 (according to www.gunviolencearchive.org). The old standards for security aren’t keeping up with the security requirements of today. Many institutions that have used metal detectors for security realize they can no longer keep large numbers of people queuing in security lines. Aside from the potential health hazard lines create, this opens up an additional security vulnerability. Venues and enterprises that have never used security screening are now budgeting to keep their visitors safe. Traditional metal detector technology just cannot address the pace of life and the ubiquitous need for security in our daily lives.

We need new standards. We need security that continually improves – touchless, free-flowing, and frictionless technology – supported by a strong concept of operations and enforced by well-trained security personnel. The days of bag checks, wands, and body checks are unacceptable and biased. We must find the weapons, not the metal. Advanced sensors and artificial intelligence are at the forefront of this evolution. This is where we come in.

We are obsessed with our customers’ success and strive to do better and be better for them. That requires authenticity and real products that work. At Evolv we do what we say and say what we do. There is no room for bravado. 

Evolv innovations are fueling the physical security transformation, disrupting the status quo. Evolv Express®, powered by Evolv Cortex AI™, can distinguish between metals that are personal items from weapons used for harm. No longer do visitors, fans, employees, and students need to stand in long lines to slog through metal detectors. They can move at the pace of life through our weapons detection systems, eliminating the potential soft targets long lines create to seamlessly flow through security. Life shouldn’t feel like airport security.

New standards call for a new brand. We’re calling it Safety in Motion. The modernized look is representative of our technological innovations in security screening, using cutting-edge technology for today’s security needs. Moreover, we wanted our new brand to reflect our mission: Transform security to enhance everyone’s life. We think it does, we hope you do too.