S 1.13 Layout of building parts requiring protection

Initiation responsibility: Top Management, Planner

Implementation responsibility: Construction Manager, Building Services Manager

Rooms or building parts worthy of protection should never be located in highly visible or particularly hazardous areas:

• Basement rooms are possibly exposed to flooding.
• Rooms on the ground floor - facing public traffic areas - are exposed to attacks, vandalism, and force majeure (traffic accidents in the vicinity of the building).
• Rooms on the ground floor facing courtyards hidden from view are exposed to a risk of break-ins and sabotage.
• Well visible rooms on the ground floor or in areas with public access are exposed, since spontaneous thefts or undesired reading of business-relevant information may be possible as a result.
• Rooms underneath flat roofs are exposed to a risk of rainwater ingress.
• Underground car parks may entail a great deal of risks: back doors hidden from view, openly accessible supply lines or IT cabling; but they also often provide unauthorised persons with a means of accessing poorly secured WLANs from vehicles. From a fire control point of view, areas in underground car parks used as storage areas are also problematic.

As a rule of thumb, it is better to place rooms or areas requiring protection in the centre of a building than near the perimeter of the building.

Ideally, these aspects are taken into account in the project planning phase of a new building or in the floor plan design phase when moving into an existing building. If the building is already in use, a new room use plan will often require the relocation of some offices to other locations in the building. As an alternative, the opportunities resulting from room layout changes that are necessary anyway should be utilised to their fullest extent.

If rooms worthy of protection can only be located at exposed locations, this should be documented explicitly within the security concept. Furthermore, additional compensatory safeguards must be taken that counteract the specific threat.

For example, an existing threat caused by water can be managed by comprehensive water detection, the establishment of thresholds, and the preparation of drainage measures for electrical service rooms or IT rooms in the basement.

Review questions:

• Have rooms worthy of protection in exposed locations been documented?
• Have sufficient safeguards been taken in order to protect rooms worthy of protection in exposed locations?