Companies, universities, and organizations of all kinds use key fobs to help secure employees, students, and assets. These key fobs function a lot like the keyless entry systems for motor vehicles, allowing the fob holder’s to enter into a building or other restricted areas. Key fobs are small electronic devices you can add to your key ring or keep in a pocket. They work with your overall access control system to manage entry through a single automatically locked door or throughout your entire facility.
How Does a Key Fob Work?
Each key fob uses a built-in, one-factor authentication program. To activate or gain access, the key fob must come close to the access control reader. Once the system verifies the key fob's access control privileges, the door or gate opens. Each individual fob has a personal identification number you can program to grant access or block entry at any time.
How Can You Use Key Fobs For Your Organization?
Key fobs are a convenient and secure way to grant access to your parking garage, offices, building, facilities, gated communities, apartment complexes, and more. In addition, you can use key fobs for access to restricted areas like storage rooms, supply closets, technical spaces, laboratories, etc.
Other uses include member or student access to gym facilities or a pool areas, and they're even becoming popular for home use. For example, a homeowner can use a key fob to give guests or service providers like house cleaners or dog walkers access to their home when they're not there. Key fobs make sense also for homeowners who offer their home for short-term rentals like Airbnb.
5 Reasons to Use Key Fobs
With few exceptions, key fobs are one of the most convenient and inexpensive ways to provide access control to a wide range of applications. They are easy to replace if lost, stolen, or worn out because you simply block the old fob and grant access to a spare fob with a new key ID.
Here are five reasons to consider adding key fobs to your access control solution.
- Selective entry. If you have numerous individuals who need access to buildings or areas, rather than handing out physical keys, use a key fob. You can customize each fob to grant access to certain people or restrict access during particular time periods. It makes secure access easy to maintain and manage.
- Increased security. Physical keys are easy to lose and difficult and expensive to replace if lost or stolen. Most often, you must change all locks when keys go missing, making it costly and time consuming. Key fobs, on the other hand, are easy to instantly block if lost or stolen, and you can issue new ones in minutes. You can also regularly change your access codes to provide even more security and integrate them with a CCTV or commercial security system. Unlike physical keys, key fobs can’t be replicated by just anyone giving you control of who will have access and when.
- Access records. Sometimes it's important to know who is in your facility and what time they entered. You can use key fobs to track visitor information, student attendance, employee movement within your facilities, and how many people are on site in case of emergency.
- Control data. Another function of key fobs is to randomly generate access codes every 30 to 60 seconds to your computer systems, network, and data. Your students or employees will have personal identification numbers to authenticate themselves after which they enter the current code randomly generated and displayed on their key fob.
- Additional functionality. As an additional service for guests, students, or employees, you can customize more than just entry to a facility or area. You can also grant access to office equipment like the copier or fax machine, vending machines, gym lockers, supply closets, and more. They're also perfect for medical facilities to control access to pharmaceuticals and medical equipment.
Final Thoughts
Key fobs are a convenient and secure way to grant or restrict access to a variety of locations or situations. If you're wondering if key fobs are the right solution for your organization, contact one of the Idesco Security Experts at 212-889-2530 today to discuss your needs. With over 75 years of experience with all makes and models of security solutions, we can help you find the right system for your security and business needs.