The smart hotels that fantasy lovers dream about already exist.

Central computers control all hotel functions: Water pressure and temperature, brightness of lights, elevator speed, security systems, ventilation, garage barriers and the fire-safety system.

Computers also help regulate heating, calculating the number of people in each room. They recognize regular guests by the magnetic cards used as room keys.

All types of hotels are getting into the high-tech world, from club hotels to huge complexes, such as the Marriott, National, Baltschug Kempinski, Sheraton Palace and Metropol.

Sergei Markov, information-security technology director at Sibintek, says security companies can offer hotels a comprehensive approach.

"A modern hotel’s security system includes local broadcasting, an intercom system and a system for evacuating people in emergencies," he said. "The building’s security system includes security and fire-alarm systems, an access-management system, turnstiles, search and surveillance technology, telesurveillance systems and an information-protection system."

Smart hotels represent a new model for relations between people and technology, saving resources and freeing people from routine operations, experts say.

Modern five-star hotels are ideal resting places for weary travelers, offering convenient parking, good restaurants, comfortable rooms and pleasant views from the windows. Professional staff do all they can for the customers, and hotel business centers offer everything needed for work.

Hotels of this category put a great deal of importance on security – guests should feel that everything around them is safe, calm and under control. A guest was murdered in the lobby of the then-Tverskaya Hotel (now a Marriott), and the assassin made a clean get-away But hotel guests should not have anything to worry about in Russia now, especially in the four- and five-star hotels.

Comprehensive security systems using the iSecure Pro access-control system from SimplexGrinnel, the OnGuard Enterprise system from Lenel Systems International and the Velocity system from Hirsch Electronics take care of security.

World-class hotels in Moscow also use systems and equipment from foreign manufacturers such as Honeywell, Enterprise Building Integration, Cisco, Hewlett-Packard Phillips (audio equipment), Polycom (video), IBM, CRONE, APC, Sony and others.

"Access control to the hotel and hotel security is ensured round the clock," said Yelena Ukhova, spokeswoman for the Sheraton Palace Hotel. "The security guards work shifts and are on duty round the clock. There is a central security center, and the system has a direct line to the city law-and-order service. When we have VIPs at the hotel – cultural figures, politicians, or when films are being shot or during sports competitions – we tighten security considerably."

Gone are the days when prostitutes had near-free access to the guest floors and rooms in many state-run hotels: Top hotels run by Western companies tolerate no such behaviour.

Survival triangle

Security issues can be divided into three main components: Smart contours of security within rooms, personal alarm systems and organizational security measures.

The latter is the simplest. Security guards, usually impressive-looking men in suits, keep constant watch over areas where hotel guests and visitors congregate, such as the reception area, banquet halls, restaurants and business centers. They do not always wear security badges, but they can provide guests with a wide range of assistance, including medical aid. Many Moscow hotels have hired former security-service agents and elite-guard unit unit veterans to protect the guests.

Smart security contours include several systems. All the platforms represent fully integrated solutions that make it possible to unite in a single complex access-control management, video-surveillance systems, fire- and burglar-alarm systems and access-card preparation. Each platform ensures that all its subsystems work reliably and effectively. Adding new security systems for new facilities or expanding functional capacity does not cost much, and the systems are all simple to operate and easy-to-service.

Since the equipment and systems management and monitoring is all done from a centralized point, three or four specialists are enough to operate it. Controllers make all the routine decisions, and information is all processed in real time. Installing the systems has no impact on the number of other service personnel, including security personnel, because the human factor has to be taken into account.

Structure and typology

Moscow hotels seem to want to be perfectly secured buidlings out of an Arthur Haily novel.

The video-surveillance systems that keep all the hotel, except guests’ rooms, under watch are the foundation of the security system. Cameras are installed in all service rooms, at the entrance, around the building’s outside and in the underground garage.

Cameras for use outside are in a special casing that protects them from the elements and sometimes also have strong lights, a swivel mechanism and wipers to clean snow or moisture from the glass. Indoor cameras are small white cylinders with an opaque half-circle underneath. They can turn 360 degrees and have a complete field of vision of the surrounding area.

Information is relayed by the cameras to the central security post, where it is observed in real time and automatically recorded in digital format. The recorded information can be used to reconstruct what happened in a particular place weeks or even months after the event.

Each frame indicates the time and date and the camera identification number, making it possible to see exactly where the information was recorded. Modern hotels that have valuable antique furniture, vases and ornaments in rooms also use data transmitters that monitor their location. If they are moved more than 50-100 centimeters, an alarm signal goes off in the security post. The National Hotel, for example, uses such data transmitters in the suites that have 19th-century antiques of cultural and historic value.

Anna Amosova, PR and advertising manager at the National, said that Suite 101, for example, one of the hotel’s presidential suites, has a mirror in a porcelain frame with amours and ornamental flowers. In Suite 107, the rooms that Lenin once lived in, is a fine Steinway piano from the early 19th century. Suite 115 has a decorated ceiling and crystal chandelier, while, in one corner, stands a porcelain vase with the portraits of Napoleon and Josephine, made in France at the beginning of the 19th century. The vase is turned 180 degrees once every two weeks, so that one half of the imperial couple is not always facing the corner.

The tragic fire in the Rossia Hotel still remains in hotel managers’ minds. Amosova said that the National has installed one of the best fire-prevention systems in Moscow, using equipment from Honeywell.

"The hotel is divided into sectors, each covered by a computer monitor and managed by a specially developed program," Amosova said. "All the hotel’s rooms have smoke detectors and sprinklers with a temperature sensor. If the temperature and amount of smoke in the room go above a certain level, the security-post operator immediately receives a fire signal. If a fire breaks out, the affected part of the building can be sealed off using fireproof doors that are adroitly concealed in the hotel’s interior."

The alarm signal also automatically goes out to the emergency services – the fire department, police and Emergency Situations Ministry.

The guests’ rooms have personal alarm systems enabling the occupants to call security guards to the room. Each bathroom has a special cord that, if pulled, makes an alarm light up in the duty guard’s post. Another alarm button is located in the bedroom next to the bedside table. These installations serve the dual purpose of security device and a way for the guest to alert hotel staff in the event of suddenly feeling ill. But, if a guest pushes the button by accident, nothing serious will happen – for the security personnel have instructions to first call the room and then, only if no one picks up the phone to send in the security shift from the relevant floor, who will arrive in a matter of seconds.

Information security is also important in the hotel business. With competition more and more intense, many hotels try to attract clients by offering a new range of modern services, including high-speed wireless Internet access. Several Moscow hotels are already installing wireless Wi-Fi networks for this purpose.

Yury Pisarev, the leading expert on radio systems for IBS, said that there are various technical measures that can be taken to prevent unauthorized access to hotels’ wireless systems. These include giving each network a unique name, encoding, automatically changing the keys to the code, filtering users by the addresses of their wireless adapters, authorization for users on the access server and other measures.

"Using these measures requires some added programming for the user’s wireless adapter, but it makes unauthorized entry into the network virtually impossible," Pisarev said. "Competently used in combination with each other, the security measures we have today resolve the specific threats that Wi-Fi systems face."

Of course, price is also an issue. Markov said that the cost of a project depends on the system’s functionality and the equipment used.

"If it’s a ready-made system, the cost will be a bit lower than for a specially developed one. The installation cost also depends on the company carrying out the project. Practice shows that it does not take long to install a ready-made system. Everything depends on the functions selected, the equipment-supply timetable and the degree of integration of the different components, as well as the professionalism of the company carrying out the project."

For top-class hotels, the company that installs the system is often chosen by an international expert council, but there are also cases of Russian companies carrying out the installation, which enables the quality to be kept high while lowering the cost of the work.

Developing the system usually takes around a year. Then, another four to six years are spent on getting it all running smoothly and integrating the components. A system of this kind is never cheap: Prices run from several hundred thousand dollars to several million. But trying to save money means losing clients. Security is expensive, but it is worth it.