ASIS Int'l Contributes to Security Standards Development

May 29, 2007 // Published as a news service by IHS

ASIS International will contribute to the process of developing professional standards in the security arena.

Reflecting this new concentration on standards development, the ASIS Board of Directors approved a name change from Commission on Guidelines to ASIS Commission on Standards and Guidelines.

International, national and regional standards bodies initiated aggressive standards development programs that will profoundly affect security practitioners, said ASIS International.

The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) launched a technical committee that is preparing security standards that will affect domestic and international communities. ASIS said it will play an important role in this technical committee (TC), ISO/TC 223: Societal Security, by lending the experience and expertise of its 35,000 members to the ISO effort.

To gain the most advantageous position possible, ASIS said it is establishing strategic relationships with national, regional and international standards bodies to provide a voice for security professionals in the standards development arena and to co-author standards to the security profession.

In the U.S., ASIS will also continue to play a role in coordinating with both Congress and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to ensure that the security expertise of its members is included in the standards development processes that are in progress.

ASIS became a member of the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) Homeland Security Standards Panel (HSSP) that is assisting DHS in the development and adoption of consensus standards critical to homeland security in the U.S.

"The commission will continue to publish guidelines both in support of standards as well as independently on important issues in security that may not lend themselves to the creation of standards," said F. Mark Geraci, CPP, chairman, ASIS Commission on Standards and Guidelines.

For more information on the ASIS International Commission on Standards and Guidelines, visit http://www.asisonline.org/guidelines/guidelines.htm.

Source: ASIS International.