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Gus Downing's Exclusive Interview with Rex Gillette, VP Retail Sales, ADT

Discussing ADT Commercial’s expansion into the EAS market.

(This week’s focus - Part 3 of 4)

Missed Part I? Read it Here | Missed Part II? Read it Here
 

Gus: Rex, With field service being one of the most frustrating and critical elements in the EAS market, ADT’s Commercial’s service and support organization has to be the largest network out there and probably your biggest asset. Can you talk about how that group is structured for Commercial vs. Residential? And how can the retailers be assured that they’ll be a priority for ADT, when this is obviously a third-party type of relationship for you and WG?

Rex: In January 2020, ADT Commercial separated its operations from ADT LLC, the residential arm of ADT. ADT Commercial is 100% dedicated to and focused on its commercial customers. From management teams to sales and support operations, ADT Commercial has the privilege of focus to only support complex, commercial enterprises.

Although EAS is a new offering from ADT Commercial, we have been serving the retail community for decades. Our customers can expect the same level of attention to detail and service they have always received from our teams.

Gus: The press release talks to helping customers build and maintain their current EAS solutions, regardless of type or manufacturer, as well as install new systems. Does this mean ADT will also be selling WG products directly to the retailers and possibly other systems as well?

Rex: ADT Commercial’s dedicated Retail National Accounts team will be selling WG’s complete portfolio of EAS systems, tags, labels, detachers, and deactivators directly to retailers. The systems are based on the 58kHz AM frequency and are compatible with all 58kHz AM systems and tags. We will also have 8.2Mhz RF specialty tags available that will work with all 8.2Mhz RF EAS systems. So, whether a retailer is looking to complement an existing installation with new specialty tags to extend product protection to new merchandise, or is in need of new systems and sensors for a new store or remodel, ADT Commercial can accommodate their needs.

Gus: Rex, this is an exciting alliance for both organizations and expands ADT’s offerings for the nation’s retailers – Why now? And what made WG the prefect partner? And how do you see it unfolding in the future?

Rex: We have considered adding EAS to our portfolio in the past, but due to business circumstances, including the merger of ADT and Protection 1 and the ensuing separation of the residential and commercial businesses, the timing was not ideal for the focus we wanted to place on this product line. Now that ADT Commercial is firmly established as a leading systems integrator in the U.S., we felt we could now dedicate the time and attention to expanding our offerings.

We chose WG Security Products, Inc., as our partner for several reasons. First and foremost is their reputation as a decades-long innovator in the Electronic Article Surveillance (EAS) solutions industry with an international presence. They also design, manufacture, sell, service and support some of the world's most advanced lines of fully integrated EAS products.

Our strategic alliance with WG Security Products allows ADT Commercial to install and service WG’s comprehensive EAS portfolio in retail environments across the U.S., expanding ADT Commercial’s breadth of offerings to include the installation, service, and maintenance of EAS solutions.

Stay tuned tomorrow for Part 4 of this Interview.
 

What Cyber Threat Trends Should Retailers Be Aware Of?
Retail Cybersecurity in an Evolving Threat Landscape
There are several global trends that could lead to challenges for retailers in the coming year. With consumers likely to continue on with more digital approaches to shopping, retailers must look at their industry’s place within the larger cybersecurity threat landscape.

Digitally Transformed Customer Experiences with Internet of Things (IoT) Devices
Many contactless payment technologies use IoT to process payments faster and reduce consumer friction. But this can often lead to more issues down the line. For example, when customers choose to pay for an item by tapping their smartwatch screens, they add a new, often insecure, technology at the point of sale, opening a new door for potential cyber threats.

Advanced Persistent Threats (APT) Persevere
The retail industry has always been a fertile ground for collecting personal data. Cardholder data, in particular, provides a rich set of information such as cardholder name, primary account number, and CVV. Malicious actors use stolen credentials to gain access to these systems and networks, disguise themselves as authorized users, and harvest data. In the second half of 2020, malicious actors persevered, increasing their APT activity.

Evolving Retailer Cybersecurity at the Speed of Business

Retailers are evolving their business models at the speed of the cloud and need their cybersecurity programs to be equally agile. With more consumers becoming accustomed to online shopping and new digital experiences, many may never shop the same way again. To protect brand reputation and these new revenue streams, retailers must secure their digital transformation strategies from the beginning, rather than considering them to be an afterthought.

Similarly, retailers must adopt new security practices and the technologies that enable them. For every new security measure organizations put into place, cyber criminals are already looking for new ways to exploit them to gain access to sensitive systems, networks, and applications. This means that retailers need dynamic and adaptive security solutions to protect their environments from attacks that continue to grow in prevalence and sophistication. Whether from an e-commerce or point-of-sale perspective, the retail industry collects, transmits, processes, and stores more digital customer data than ever before. To ensure consistent and secure customer experiences, retailers must take a holistic approach to digital transformation by seeking out technology and platforms that build security into the fabric of connectivity. fortinet.com

Retailers Increasingly Vulnerable to Hackers
Prioritize retail cybersecurity to protect valued shoppers
The retail landscape has drastically changed in recent years, with a major move to e-commerce that only escalated during the pandemic. As more retailers constantly roll out new processes for in-store and online payments, along with digital shopping experiences on social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram, they become more vulnerable to hackers. And the more data retailers collect, the better the chance of a breach. The only way for retailers to combat cybercriminals in their stores and online is to take a multi-faceted approach.

Retailers should think of themselves as bodyguards, always working to protect their business and customers.

Stay ahead of the bad guys
As technology becomes more sophisticated, so do the hackers. To stay ahead of the bad guys, retailers must consistently reassess and update their security systems to incorporate new technology. While it may be overwhelming at first, as well as expensive, it pays off in the long run. According to insurance carrier Hiscox, digital incidents cost businesses $200,000 on average. You don’t want to play an even more costly game of catch-up after a breach; or suffer the biggest loss, which is trusted customers.

Prevent internal breaches
Protecting your customers’ sensitive information also begins in-house and with your employees. It’s vital to control what employees can access, which could mean limiting them to only what they need for their daily tasks and banning the use of removable media like USB drives and personal laptops/computers at work. Also, employees should go through regular cybersecurity training, which could help them detect scammers who send phishing emails and enable them to correctly respond to fraudulent requests.

Employers should be in constant communication about the latest threats and trends, so employees know how to combat them. That could also look like yearly seminars where retailers and employees are taken through cybersecurity exercises meant to help recognize and stop breaches or attacks.

Lastly, plan for the worst. Every retailer should have a recovery plan in place should a cyberattack occur, including a communications strategy on how to handle the backlash. As the digital world keeps evolving, so should your security practices. bizjournals.com

Security Leaders Still Too Disconnected from Chief Executives
Despite Heightened Cyber-Risks, Few Security Leaders Report to CEO

New report suggests top management at most companies still don't get security.

Despite mounting concerns over data breaches and the growing sophistication of the threat landscape, top management at most organizations still don't appear to view cybersecurity as a business-critical function.

A survey of 1,426 security professionals recently conducted by the Ponemon Institute for LogRhythm found just 7% of organizations represented in the survey had security leaders reporting directly to the CEO. The remaining 93% have their security leaders reporting to other executives, including the chief information officer (24%), director or manager of IT (19%), chief technology officer (12%), vice president of IT (11%), or chief revenue officer (9%).

Far from being close to the CEO, the survey shows the average security leader is, in fact, three levels removed from the chief executive, making it challenging for them to clearly articulate enterprise security risks to top leadership. Most security leaders don't have a direct relationship with the CEO and the board, even though they have complete ownership or significant influence over their organizations' cybersecurity budgets. Respondents to the LogRhythm/Ponemon survey reported an annual security budget of $38 million, or roughly 24% of their organization's average IT budget of $159 million.

"Cybersecurity leaders have assumed more accountability and risk but struggle to achieve the desired security posture because they are not as influential as other members of their peer group," says Mark Logan, CEO of LogRhythm.

Going into the survey, LogRhythm expected to find many CEOs were still failing to recognize the importance of the cybersecurity function, Logan says. Even so, the fact that only 7% of security leaders report directly to the CEO was surprising, he says.

"That is an extremely low percentage considering cybersecurity is a critical business function," he says.

The issue of top management not giving the cybersecurity function and CISOs/CSOs enough attention has been long-standing. Security experts have long noted how the C-suite and boards of directors have often tended to view cybersecurity as a cost center and tactical firefighting operation rather than as a strategic business enabler. Security leaders themselves have often taken the blame for being overly technical and unable to articulate security challenges to the C-suite in terms of business risk and risk management. darkreading.com

Embrace integrations and automation as you build a security program

Cloud security skills in high demand

A Wake-Up Call for Cybersecurity in Canada
The "Tylenol" Moment the Canadian Food Industry Needed Amid Cyber Attacks
Meat processing giant JBS paid out an $11 million ransom following a cyber attack, according to reports. Most of its meat packing facilities, including the one in Alberta, remained idle for a few days. For years, most of us linked the concept of cyber attacks with IT companies, governments, and media. Experts have been warning the food industry for years about the threat of becoming an active target for hackers. What was once purely academic has now become a reality.

Until now, efforts to counter cyber attacks in the industry have been timid, at best. At the very least, it was not an openly discussed topic amongst industry leaders. The fact that the world’s largest processor of beef and pork was targeted by hackers earlier this month is certainly a cause for concern and can serve as a major wake-up call. We can easily imagine that other companies like Cargill, Olymel, Maple Ridge Farms, McCain, Maple Leaf, Lassonde, Sysco, Loblaw’s, Sobeys, Metro, and other major players could also become a target.

The food industry is a critical piece of our economy, and changes in the industry are making it a more likely target in the future. Operations are adopting high-tech innovations like drones, GPS mapping, soil sensors, autonomous tractors, artificial intelligence and more. These changes in the industry are needed, but they can also make it a primary target. As the industry becomes more data-driven, it will also become more vulnerable to cyber attacks. On the other side of the digital spectrum, many food operations still use outdated operating systems like Windows 98. One can only hope that most management teams in the food industry are reviewing their IT systems and figuring out how vulnerable they are to cyber attacks.

In essence, with the attack on JBS, the food industry has just experienced its own “Tylenol” moment. In 1982, some people tampered with bottles of Tylenol in Chicago-area retail stores and poisoned several people, killing at least seven. Many bottles were laced with potassium cyanide. At the time, bottle packaging practices were not the same and the murderers took the industry completely by surprise. That incident led to significant changes in how bottles were sealed and secured. Hopefully, the JBS incident will also lead to increased security and protection. retail-insider.com

Montreal-Based Scheme Targeted Thousands of Internet Users
How a worldwide subscription scam network was traced back to Montreal

Online users lured to websites through misleading advertising, Radio-Canada investigation finds

A Montreal-based marketing firm is at the heart of a scheme involving a massive network of streaming websites that has scammed thousands of internet users out small amounts totalling hundreds of millions of dollars with promises of free unlimited access to premium content that they do not offer, a Radio-Canada investigation has found.

The websites are run by a Barbados company called Hyuna International and offer users access to movies, books and music.

Users were lured to those sites through false promises and misleading advertising set up by subcontractors collecting commissions from AdCenter, a web marketing company run out of sleek and modern offices in downtown Montreal, the investigation by the disinformation-busting program Décrypteurs found.

The investigation revealed that both AdCenter and Hyuna International are linked to a Canadian businessman, Philip Keezer. This network uses a complicated web of hundreds of nearly identical websites and offshore shell companies to evade scrutiny, according to sources and experts cited in the report.

AdCenter is an affiliate marketing company, a legal and widespread practice. In this type of marketing, partners called affiliates promote goods and services and receive a commission every time a client they refer makes a purchase. Affiliates are not employees, but rather subcontractors.

Unlike other affiliate marketing companies, AdCenter has only one client: Hyuna International. Its affiliates are only paid when they convince someone to use their credit card information to sign up to one of Hyuna's sites. cbc.ca

Canada Retail Sales Declined 5.7% in April on Virus Restrictions

Disney to Shut All Stores in British Columbia as Phase 1 of a Canadian Exit

Oxford Properties Launches Outdoor Patios at Enclosed Mall Properties in Canada

Winnipeg, MB: Man who allegedly shot at c-store clerk arrested
Police in Winnipeg say they've caught up with a man suspected of firing off a sawed-off shotgun and almost hitting a convenience store clerk during a recent North End robbery. The robbery happened the morning of June 6 in the 500 block of Selkirk Avenue. Police say two men, one of them armed with the gun, walked into the store and demanded cash, cigarettes and lottery tickets.

The armed suspect fired off a round, "narrowly missing" the employee, police said. Wednesday, officers on patrol around Flora Avenue and McKenzie street spotted the suspect. He tried to run, police said, but was nabbed. He was "non-compliant" during his arrest, police said, and he and the two arresting officers were injured as a result. cbc.ca

Dog Tracks Down Liquor Store Robbery Crew
Calgary, AB: Police dog bites bystander during arrest of 5 robbery suspects
A police dog bit a bystander in the process of chasing down five individuals alleged to have been involved in a Saturday afternoon robbery of a Calgary liquor store. Police allege the suspects robbed an ACE Liquor store in southeast Calgary at approximately 12:30 p.m. and fled in a stolen vehicle toward Chestermere, Alta.

Police eventually located the suspects in the parking lot of the Calgary Zoo. All five occupants exited the vehicle and proceeded to flee, police said. Two police dogs were sent after the suspects. While chasing one of the suspects, one of the dogs encountered a bystander and bit them.

Police said the dogs' handler went to help the bystander while EMS treated them. The bystander would later be transported to hospital for treatment of their injuries. cbc.ca

Vancouver, BC: $50,000 boulder back on display at B.C. store after heist
A 3,000-pound Jade boulder that was stolen from a B.C. gift shop last year is now on display again. The massive mineral is an iconic landmark in the village of Cache Creek, where it sat outside Cariboo Jade & Gifts for decades until thieves with an excavator stole it overnight shortly before last Christmas. Shortly after the theft, police recovered the thieves' truck and trailer, but not the boulder. It wasn't until after Christmas that someone spotted the stone dumped in a snowy ditch and notified authorities. bc.ctvnews.ca

Knife-wielding bandits rob Whitby drug store

Winnipeg, MB: Suspect busted in connection with c-store armed robbery

Timmins, ON: Woman charged with impaired driving also accused of armed robbery

Police seek gunman behind spate of Ottawa armed robberies

Midland, ON: Man accused of robbing 2 convenience stores 12 hours apart

Barrie, ON: Police seek witnesses to armed robbery

View Canadian Connections Archives
 

Sixth Individual Admits Participation in Victoria's Secret $100K Theft Scheme
Leonard C Boyle, Acting United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut, and William S. Walker, Acting Special Agent in Charge of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) in Boston, announced that SHARNICE JACKSON, 20, of Hartford, pleaded guilty today to a conspiracy offense related to a scheme to defraud Victoria’s Secret stores in Connecticut and Massachusetts. According to court documents and statements made in court, Jackson and others were involved in a scheme through which they stole thousands of dollars from L Brands, the parent company of Victoria’s Secret stores. As part of the scheme, the co-conspirators shoplifted merchandise from Victoria’s Secret stores in Connecticut and Massachusetts. They then returned the shoplifted Victoria’s Secret merchandise through a “No Original Receipt” return, which allowed them to obtain gift cards for Victoria’s Secret in the value of the stolen merchandise (the “Return Step”). The co-conspirators then redeemed the gift cards at Victoria’s Secret stores for merchandise that slightly exceeded the value of the gift card, so that the excess amount was charged to a debit card connected to a co-conspirator (the “Redeem Step”). They then returned the merchandise purchased in the Redeem Step, with the refund for the entire amount credited to the co-conspirator’s debit card (the “Refund Step”). Between approximately October 2018 and October 2019, L Brands lost more than $100,000 as a result of this scheme. justice.gov

Palo Alto, CA: 7 Suspects Sought In Latest Palo Alto Handbag Heist; $50,000 In Merchandise Stolen
Police in Palo Alto are searching for at least seven people suspected of stealing $50,000 in handbags Monday, as they investigate possible connections to two recent heists nearby. Investigators said the theft took place at The RealReal on University Avenue shortly before 6 p.m. According to investigators, five of the suspects entered the store and began ripping handbags from their security cables.

A security guard at the store attempted to block the suspects, but they were able to push him out of the way. Police said the guard then followed them out of the store, where he was confronted by two additional suspects who were waiting outside. One of the suspects told the guard “Don’t make me pull the gun,” police said, but the guard did not see a weapon. Store employees said about 20 bags were stolen. Police said the suspects were described as males in their 20s, who were all wearing face coverings and hooded clothing with the hoods up. ktvu.com

Wilkes-Barre, PA: Three men stole $4,200 worth of electrical wire from Lowe’s
Township police say three “hard working men” stole $4,200 worth of electrical wire from Lowe’s Home Improvement in Arena Hub Plaza. In a post on the police department’s Facebook page Monday, police said three men loaded packages of 12/2 wire onto a cart and failed to pay for the merchandise on June 5. “They must have been in a rush because they forgot to stop and pay for the items at one of the many open registers. They didn’t even bother to pretend to go to the self check-out,” police posted about the theft. Police also apologized as the theft of 12/2 electrical wire packages most likely impacted anyone needed that type of wire for their weekend project. “We watched some quality videos with high production values showing their exploits. The video was so clear we made popcorn while watching,” police posted in reference to the clear surveillance video. Police said the electrical wire packages were loaded into a black Volkswagen Jetta that has a Pennsylvania license plate LHR 2783. “While we can identify one of the males in the photographs…we would love to meet the other two men and remind them to pay for the wire. All in all we gave it four out of five stars. it would have been five, but they lost one star for poor costume choices,” police posted in a jab at one of the suspect’s clothing. timesleader.com

El Cerrito, CA: Suspect Sought In Grab & Run Robbery At Walgreens
Authorities are searching for a man suspected of stealing at least $500 in goods from an El Cerrito pharmacy last week. Police said the suspect entered the Walgreens located on San Pablo Avenue around 2:50 p.m. on June 16. According to witnesses, the suspect loaded the goods from a display into a basket. When the suspect was confronted by employees at the door, police said he drew a baton and threatened employees. The suspect allegedly also had a firearm in his waistband, which prompted employees to let the suspect go. sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com

West Whiteland Township, PA: Police investigating a $1,278 electronics theft from Target

Winter Haven, FL: Shoplifter steals nearly $800 in purses from Country Primitives Vintage Market, returns, takes 2 more

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While most people try to avoid risk and corporate America actually labels it to be avoided at all cost ultimately life is filled with it. Risk taking is something everyone is faced with and without it life would become somewhat stagnate. Taking a risk once in a while is a healthy thing. It pushes people to do sometimes their most creative work and reach new levels. The problem becomes the fear of risk and hesitation. It seems like our society has become so risk avoidance driven that people are applauded for not taking it. When in actuality it is those who take risk that pave the road for all others to travel. As Joseph Campbell, a famous American mythologist once said, it is the darkest path in the woods that holds the most treasure. Next time you're faced with taking a risk give it some thought who knows your career may take off!


Just a Thought,
Gus

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