This post covers why real-time threat intelligence is critical to employee safety and how AlertMedia customers turn critical information into action.
Emergency Management Oct 11, 2024
How AlertMedia Customers Use Real-Time Intelligence to Protect Their People and Business
Threat Intelligence Key Feature Guide
Gain instant clarity into emerging threats with analyst-verified intelligence and AI-driven early signals.
In today’s rapidly evolving world, threats facing businesses are becoming more complex and unpredictable while increasing in scale and frequency. Extreme weather events, driven by climate change, have been a significant cause of supply chain disruptions.
For instance, Hurricane Helene flooded a small mountain town in North Carolina that supplied nearly all of the world’s purest quartz, a necessary mineral for semiconductor production. The disruption to the supply chain of this valuable material put a 600 billion-dollar global industry at staggering risk. Destructive storms like Helene are becoming more likely, and the global impacts can disable businesses.
Other threats, such as the widespread demonstrations during the 2024 global elections, can cause transportation delays and put local communities and business travelers at risk if tensions escalate into violence.
Why do thousands of organizations worldwide partner with AlertMedia to help them monitor, identify, and respond to threats?
Preparing to manage risks like these requires timely and accurate information. Having a reliable system to monitor and assess emerging and ongoing threats is no longer a luxury—it’s a necessity. That is why thousands of organizations worldwide partner with AlertMedia to help them monitor, identify, and respond to threats.
AlertMedia Threat Intelligence acts as a workforce multiplier to improve your internal team’s ability to monitor major global events or localized incidents that could impact your employees, locations, and assets. Our team of in-house analysts works around the clock to monitor thousands of data sources, filter out the noise, and deliver only the most relevant view of events that may impact your people and business. Coupled with robust emergency communication capabilities, AlertMedia allows your safety and security teams to monitor for threats, automate real-time warnings, and communicate with impacted individuals seamlessly from one platform.
Here are a few examples of how this real-time, verified intelligence can help your organization make informed decisions.
AlertMedia Helps FCC Protect Its Employees and Operations
The manufacturing industry is particularly vulnerable to rising threats such as global supply chain disruptions, severe weather, and regulatory changes. As a result, many manufacturing companies have innovated, finding ways to limit the impact of these challenges and prevent even more significant economic consequences.
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For example, FCC North America uses AlertMedia to identify and assess the impact of relevant threats to their business and communicate critical information to their people worldwide. FCC manufactures clutch assembly products for the automotive industry and operates five facilities across North America. Like many other manufacturing companies, FCC constantly monitors threats that might impact its people and operations across multiple locations and its international supply chain, where disruptions are incredibly costly.
AlertMedia’s threat intelligence solution enables FCC to keep a pulse on any threats that may disrupt business logistics. “Some of the parts we need for manufacturing assembly are sourced from Asia. A severe weather event impacting Vietnam or Thailand could delay shipments and impact our operations. AlertMedia’s threat intelligence gives our leadership team visibility into unfolding events around the world that could potentially disrupt business operations so that they can take proactive steps to mitigate the risk,” says Michael Hunt, FCC’s ERP Systems and IT Manager.
They also track threats that could put their employees in harm’s way, both on-site and near their employees’ homes. With real-time, reliable threat insights, FCC can rapidly notify employees of any unfolding events that might impact them locally. Diana Pethtel, ERP Systems Staff Administrator at FCC, says, “By monitoring emerging threats in relation to where employees live and work, we can drastically improve employee safety. If an employee’s been on the manufacturing floor all day without access to the latest news, AlertMedia allows us to give them a heads up about any threats that could impact them before they head home.”
“AlertMedia’s threat intelligence greatly enhances our ability to protect our employees and operations. It enables us to not only identify emerging threats but also quantify their impact on our business. Automating the impact assessment and real-time communication around emerging events allows us to operate with unprecedented safety, visibility, and efficiency.”
—Michael Hunt, ERP Systems and IT Manager at FCC
—Michael Hunt, ERP Systems and IT Manager at FCC
Once FCC identifies a threat and assesses its impact, they use AlertMedia’s multichannel communication tool to send targeted notifications to those affected, helping improve employee safety and business continuity initiatives.
Warby Parker Uses AlertMedia to Scale Its Safety Initiatives Across Hundreds of Locations
In addition to helping FCC protect their highly dispersed business assets and employees, AlertMedia’s threat intelligence team helps Warby Parker, the wildly successful glasses retailer, safeguard their employees and store locations during critical events (including the 2020 Nashville bombing).
Traditionally, the primary motivation of the retail industry’s asset protection plan has been to reduce theft. However, in a recent interview on The Employee Safety Podcast, Chris Hinger, Warby Parker’s Director of Loss Prevention, touches on a shift in loss prevention priorities, “We’re no longer just focused on shrink or theft. The loss prevention industry has shifted from being reactive and transactional to having proactive plans across different business channels. For us, employee safety is absolutely one of those channels. I think the main reason for this shift has been the increased risk our frontline workers face, whether in stores or corporate offices.”
Today, in addition to theft, retailers must also monitor events like acts of violence, severe weather, and political demonstrations that can impact the health and safety of thousands of employees and customers across multiple locations.
For example, on Christmas Day in 2020, a bomb exploded inside an RV in downtown Nashville. The damage from the bomb was widespread. Many businesses in the area were impacted, including the AT&T building. Damage to the AT&T building led to widespread service outages throughout the region.
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Warby Parker has two retail stores and a corporate office in the downtown area. The company used AlertMedia to locate their employees near the event and send a survey to ask whether or not they required medical attention. The ability to get instant feedback allowed Warby Parker to quickly identify what actions they needed to take to ensure the safety of their people in the area.
Once Warby Parker confirmed their people’s safety, they shifted from an emergency response to a business continuity plan. Because of the widespread internet outages in the area, Warby Parker sent out a survey over multiple channels, such as text and voice messages, to determine if their employees scheduled to work at their two Nashville store locations would be able to work their shifts. This real-time feedback helped Warby Parker decide whether they needed to shift resources and how best to assist their employees impacted by the outages.
Given the number and diversity of threats facing retail businesses, organizations must develop robust asset protection and business continuity plans that can effectively scale across hundreds of locations. With a plan in place, retail companies can proactively and efficiently respond to threats and help increase the organization’s profitability. From aiding in loss prevention strategies to helping them keep their people and businesses safe during critical events, AlertMedia has proven to be a valuable asset for Warby Parker and their employees.
Explore the Key Features of AlertMedia’s Threat Intelligence Solution
Cutting Through the Noise to Deliver Actionable Intelligence
Much like monitoring happenings worldwide for a newsroom, monitoring threats for a business is a 24/7, 365-day-a-year job. However, the stakes are arguably much higher with personal safety on the line.
Executing an effective threat monitoring strategy starts with having the right mix of sources and, more importantly, the headcount and skillset to quickly identify relevant threats, gather context, and weed out misinformation that could lead valuable resources down a distracting rabbit hole. Unfortunately, most organizations don’t have the resources to employ robust, 24/7 global security operation centers to monitor hundreds of independent information sources like local news, social channels, and the National Weather Service.
Some AI-driven intelligence solutions can aggregate large data sets and open source signals, but this still requires the infrastructure and expertise to turn this into actionable intelligence. Organizations must still distill what is essential to their business and contextualize it geographically to understand how it will impact their people and operations.
That is why it is necessary to have a team of skilled analysts to effectively comb through the mountain of information available and verify legitimate threats before alerting relevant parties. You can deploy a quicker and more effective response when you can trust that you’re getting the most accurate and actionable information about emerging threats.
Pohlad Companies Safeguards Over 35 Locations Globally With AlertMedia
Founded by Carl Pohlad in the 1950s, Minneapolis-based Pohlad Companies is a family-owned holding company with interests in various industries, from sports and entertainment to commercial real estate, engineering, and more. With a diverse range of organizations and over 3,000 employees to protect, Pohlad Companies needed to ensure it could effectively identify threats and communicate with employees, regardless of industry or location.
After evaluating several emergency communication platforms, Pohlad Companies chose AlertMedia for its reliability, adaptability, and ease of use. With AlertMedia, Pohlad Companies has equipped the organizations it owns with the threat intelligence and emergency communication capabilities they need to keep their people safe, informed, and connected during any crisis. AlertMedia’s full-featured mobile app gives the security team a global reach and the ability to geofence areas around facility and employee locations. With targeted threat monitoring, Mike Goldstein, Vice President of Security and Information Technology, and his team can receive timely updates wherever they may be and quickly notify employees of a potential threat. “The mobile app and geofencing capabilities are two features I really don’t know how I’d operate without,” adds Goldstein.
“AlertMedia’s threat intelligence capabilities allow us to provide accurate, vetted information to employees about critical incidents—and ensure they know the difference between real threats and false alarms,” says Goldstein. With a solution that combines global threat intelligence alerts and reliable, two-way emergency communication into one easy-to-use platform, Pohlad Companies and its holdings can access the critical, time-sensitive information they need to protect their employees and facilities.
For example, when extreme weather affected the location of their holding PAR Systems in Brunswick, Georgia, Luke Roloff, Senior Risk Manager at PAR Systems, could easily communicate with employees and advise them on steps they needed to take to stay safe. “During hurricane season, our team in Georgia experiences significant storms,” explains Roloff. “AlertMedia allows us to instantly communicate with every employee in the path of the storm, even when they’re at home, when the local infrastructure could be down, or when our server network could be down. Having that backup is vital.” AlertMedia has become synonymous with security and peace of mind for Pohlad and all their holding companies.
Twilio Modernizes Duty of Care for a Global, Remote-First Workforce
Twilio is a customer engagement platform used by nearly 350,000 companies to build personalized experiences for their customers. Founded in 2008, the company has grown into a remote-first organization with 5,500 employees—known as Twilions—working across home offices, corporate hubs in five countries, and thousands of coworking spaces around the world.
Keeping a highly distributed and mobile workforce safe presents a unique challenge. With employees working and traveling across regions with varying risk profiles, Twilio needed a faster, more reliable way to identify emerging threats, understand who could be impacted, and communicate critical information. Twilio turned to AlertMedia’s integrated Threat Intelligence and Emergency Communication solution, giving its 24/7 Global Security Operations Center (GSOC) analyst-verified intelligence and real-time workforce location data in one platform. Today, the team can identify risks earlier, quickly determine which employees may be affected, and deliver targeted communications to help keep Twilions informed and safe wherever they work.
“AlertMedia’s open source intelligence monitoring capabilities provide us with actionable Threat Intelligence that’s become essential to the mitigation of threats facing Twilions and Twilio assets around the globe.”
—Shelley Benoliel, Senior Director of Corporate Safety & Security at Twilio.
—Shelley Benoliel, Senior Director of Corporate Safety & Security at Twilio.
Twilio’s 24/7 Global Security Operations Center (GSOC) uses AlertMedia to monitor emerging threats and quickly determine which employees and assets could be impacted. AlertMedia’s Live Intelligence Feed gives the team a steady stream of analyst-verified intelligence, while Situation Reports provide additional context around incidents that may require closer attention. For weather-related threats like hurricanes and wildfires, Twilio also uses AlertMedia’s live radar overlay to visualize potential impacts and focus its monitoring efforts.
Bringing Threat Intelligence and Emergency Communication together in one platform has also helped Twilio streamline its response. “Having intel and communication in one place gives us the speed-to-notification we need—fewer clicks, fewer chair turns, and a far faster path from detection to action,” says Shelley Benoliel, Senior Director of Corporate Safety & Security at Twilio. With up-to-date employee data in AlertMedia, the GSOC can geofence areas around developing threats, identify nearby employees and assets, and quickly determine who may need to be notified.
AlertMedia also enables Twilio to tailor communications based on factors like location, travel status, role, or function. The GSOC can deliver notifications across multiple channels—including text, email, WhatsApp, voice, and the mobile app—and conduct wellness checks following critical incidents so employees can quickly confirm their safety or request assistance. Twilio has expanded its use of the platform to address operational disruptions as well, including utility outages and transportation issues.
With faster threat detection and more precise communication, Twilio has strengthened both its situational awareness and employees’ trust in the security team. More targeted alerts and relevant context help employees understand why a notification matters and what action they should take. “It’s important that the trust we extend to our customers is mirrored in how we look after our own people, and AlertMedia is how we do that,” says Benoliel.
Parting Thought
Given the increasing frequency and severity of threats, having a comprehensive threat intelligence and emergency communication solution is now a critical requirement for any organization looking to enhance employee safety and business continuity. AlertMedia helps thousands of organizations tackle the growing complexity of keeping a remote workforce safe with access to fast, location-aware intelligence and a more reliable way to communicate when every second counts.
Download Our Threat Intelligence Key Feature Guide
Gain instant clarity into emerging threats with analyst-verified intelligence and AI-driven early signals.
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