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IN BRIEF Iron Mountain Opens Facility in India The 28,000-square-foot facility will provide worldwide support for Iron Mountain’s internal technology infrastructure and business operations, including internal technology applications and databases used to power Iron Mountain’s records management and storage, data backup and recovery, document management and secure shredding offerings as well as support for enrolling new customers.
The acquisition of Filesaver follows the company’s purchase of Iron Mountain New Zealand in October 2011.
The new facility covers 80,000 square feet and provides off-site data and records management services. It has been given high-level security clearance by the U.K. government.
Brunswick Document Management, founded in 1998, is focused on serving customers throughout the Northeastern region of England. Also in late 2011, Restore plc’s Restore Shred Ltd. subsidiary acquired the business and assets of Thoroughshred, a shredding and recycling company, from TGM Environmental Ltd. Iron Mountain Opens UK Document Scanning Center The Stafford scanning center measures roughly 25,000 square feet and, according to Iron Mountain, can deliver as many as 250 million documents per year when operating at full capacity. Services provided through the U.K. document scanning center include secure document collection and delivery; scanning; information extraction, indexing and validation; secure storage; data retrieval; and end-of-life document destruction. |
Media Services Expands
Media Services has announced the expansion of its underground facility in Kansas City, Mo., to accommodate growth in its record center and scanning departments.
Media Services says its underground facilities ensure security and a climate-controlled environment.
The new space will allow for expanded production capabilities, including electronic medical record (EMR) conversions, scan-on-demand (SOD) and storage of archival items.
“This expansion accommodates new clients as well as the growing needs of current clients,” Operations Manager Gregory Turner says.
Media Services has a second location in the Meritex Executive Park in Lenexa, Kan. The Lenexa location also is underground and operates as a record center.
Media Services, with its ShredTime destruction division, is a locally owned record center offering a full range of record management services, including document imaging, record storage, secure shredding, off-site data storage and records and information management consulting. The company is AAA Certified to the standard for secure destruction operations developed by the National Association for Information Destruction (NAID), Phoenix, and is a member of PRISM International, Garner, N.C.
AIM Acquires Assets in Santa Barbara, Calif.
Access Information Management (AIM), a Livermore, Calif.-based firm that provides records management and destruction services for hard copy and electronic records, has acquired assets from two Santa Barbara, Calif.-based companies.
AIM has acquired Santa Barbara File Storage in full and the hard-copy records inventory from Bekins of Santa Barbara. According to AIM, the two acquisitions make it the only full-service records and information management (RIM) company based in Santa Barbara County.
AIM says it will continue to serve its existing clients locally. The company also opened a new Santa Barbara-based, full-service records center in January 2012, with Robert Cummings serving as general manager of the facility.
“We are proud to announce the acquisition of two Santa Barbara-based records storage companies and the opening of a new record center facility, expanding our California presence and furthering our commitment in the region,” says Rob Alston, CEO of Access Information Management. “While we currently serve many businesses in Santa Barbara County, this new facility will provide us a significant competitive advantage in the market as the only RIM company with a facility actually located within Santa Barbara County—less than 1 mile from Main Street.”
Naviant Expands Service into Milwaukee
Naviant, a content management solutions provider headquartered in Verona, Wis., has expanded its services to cover the city of Milwaukee and surrounding communities.
“Our full-service records storage center provides customers in the greater Milwaukee area with full-service archival and day-forward records storage and conversion services solutions,” Naviant President Mike Suter says.
“Our state-of-the-art records storage center in Madison, Wis., coupled with industry-leading inventory management and scan-on-demand retrieval services, allows us to become an extension of each customer’s filing room and records storage management department,” he adds.
Naviant’s records management services include outsourced records services, off-site records storage, destruction, scanning and conversion services, scan-on-demand services, data tape rotation and vault storage.
NAID Announces Recent CSDS Designees
More than 100 individuals have earned the Certified Secure Destruction Specialist (CSDS) designation following the results of the Jan. 5 examination, according to the National Association for Information Destruction (NAID). The Phoenix-based association developed the CSDS program for secure destruction professionals to demonstrate their competencies in data protection legislation, secure destruction operations, physical security, records management, risk management, ethics and NAID certification.
NAID is a nonprofit trade association for the secure destruction industry, currently representing more than 1,800 member locations globally. NAID’s mission is to promote the proper destruction of discarded information and to encourage the outsourcing of destruction needs to qualified contractors.
“These industry professionals should be very proud of themselves,” says NAID CEO Bob Johnson. “No one passes this test without a lot of hard work and dedication. Best of all, they’ve set themselves up for success, not simply by having the CSDS credential, but by developing a comprehensive understanding of our dynamic industry.”
NAID says it created the CSDS accreditation to promote and acknowledge a range of disciplines in the secure destruction industry.
The CSDS accreditation exam is designed to establish an individual’s competency in those disciplines. The examination has 300 questions from seven subject areas.
To help industry professionals prepare for the exam, NAID provides a CSDS handbook and sample exam on its website as well as a 10-session CSDS training webinar series.
“Overall, we’ve had an 85 percent passing rate, which is phenomenal considering how difficult this exam is,” says Jamie Steimer, NAID director of events and programs.
“Those who participated in the web- inar series were among the individuals who saw the best results.”
The following individuals passed the most recent exam and can now display CSDS credentials:
- Randy Brusso, Mohave Shred;
- Scott Dennis, Rapid Shred;
- James W. Dowse, Shred Services Inc.;
- Larry Hess, Harris Micrographics;
- Clint Phillips, DataGuard Inc.;
- Adam Reitman, Intek Leasing;
- Greg Reuter, Green Delete Inc.;
- Melissa Rinehimer, GigaBiter Inc.;
- Renee Schafer, Data Security Inc.; and
- Avery Sullivan, Green Delete Inc.
CSDS examinations were scheduled for Jan. 12 in Seattle, Jan. 19 in Chicago and Jan. 26 in Denver. A CSDS examination also will be held March 30 in conjunction with the NAID 2012 Annual Conference and Expo in Anaheim, Calif.
More information about upcoming training, exams and registration is available by contacting accreditation@naidonline.org or by visiting NAID’s website at www.naidonline.org.
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Titan Ranks in Philadelphia Titan Mobile Shredding, Doylestown, Pa., has announced that it is among the 2011 Philadelphia 100, a ranking of the 100 fastest growing privately held companies in the Greater Philadelphia area. Titan ranked at No. 87 on the list, which is based on verified revenue growth. The Wharton Small Business Development Center, the Entrepreneurs’ Forum of Greater Philadelphia and the Philadelphia Business Journal conducted the evaluation process for the rankings. According to the Philadelphia 100 website, “The integrity of the process and the resulting list makes the Philadelphia 100 one of the most sought awards in the region.” The list was established in 1988 by The Wharton Small Business Development Center, the Entrepreneurs’ Forum of Greater Philadelphia and the Philadelphia Business Journal. Bob Leventhal and Don Adriaansen started Titan Mobile Shredding in the fall of 2005. Titan provides on-site document, media and hard drive destruction as well as computer recycling to companies in eastern Pennsylvania and central New Jersey.
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Cintas Bids Good Riddance to 2011
Cintas Corp., Cincinnati, has announced the winners of its second annual Good Riddance Day Contest. Kathleen Selman of Tampa, Fla., won the individual prize package, while Barrington Research Associates in Chicago won the business prize package.
As the individual prize package winner, Selman received a five-night trip to New York City for Good Riddance Day Dec. 28 and designation as the first to say “good riddance” to her worries or bad memories from 2011.
Barrington Research Associates won an office organization package and a Cintas SmartShred™ event.
Good Riddance Day brings hundreds of people together to shed, and shred, their worst memories of the past year and enter the New Year with a clean slate. This year, hundreds of people and businesses across the nation submitted brief descriptions of a 2011 memory or experience they would like to say “good riddance” to heading into the New Year. After receiving more than 600 entries, Cintas Document Management selected the winners.
Selman said “good riddance” to long military deployments so her five children can see their father and uncle more often and celebrate the holidays together.
Barrington Research Associates entered the contest after more than 28 years of old documents began to overwhelm the office. The business is still mostly paper based and was forced to use an extra office to store the overflow of documents. Barrington Research Associates was ready to say “good riddance” to outdated and unnecessary files and get organized for 2012.
For this annual New Year’s tradition, Cintas provided one of its mobile shredding trucks in Times Square, teaming up with co-organizers of New Year’s Eve in Times Square, the Times Square Alliance and Countdown Entertainment. The event was Dec. 28 on the Broadway Plaza between 43rd and 44th Streets.
Karen Carnahan, president and COO, Cintas Document Management, said, “From old credit card bills to parking tickets, consumers can say ‘good riddance’ to their worst memories of 2011 and rest assured knowing they have been safely destroyed using our secure mobile shredding unit.”
Paper Recycling & Shredding Specialists Achieves NAID AAA Certification
Paper Recycling & Shredding Specialists, based in the San Diego area, has received AAA Certification for on-site and off-site document shredding from the National Association for Information Destruction (NAID), Phoenix. With a fleet of 18 vehicles, including 14 Shred-Tech on-site shredding trucks, Paper Recycling & Shredding Specialists also reports it has completed its residential expansion business and has begun to host domestic “Shred Days” throughout Southern California counties.
Don Weijland, president of Paper Recycling & Shredding Specialists, says, “We’re very proud of our NAID AAA Certification, as it validates many of the procedures we’ve put in place to effectively shred and dispose of our clients’ documents in an efficient and eco-friendly manner. We’ve witnessed significant changes with paper recycling and document destruction over the past 30 years, and we’re delighted with our NAID Certification, as it reassures the general public and helps them feel comfortable bringing their documents to us for effective destruction and disposal.”
In addition to providing secure document disposal, Paper Recycling & Shredding Specialists operates a fleet of secure collection vehicles to transport documents to a secure location for off-site shredding.
More information is available at www.mobileshred.net.
London’s Commercial Trash Containers Hold Confidential Data
According to a study commissioned by the National Association for Information Destruction (NAID), Phoenix, many London-area organizations engage in the casual disposal of sensitive personal information. NAID commissioned the study to determine whether organization were taking the recently escalated data protection fines of £500,000 (US$790,000) and the publicity about ID theft seriously.
In a month-long study, private investigators examined the contents of the city’s publicly accessible commercial trash containers to determine the amount of personal information present, according to NAID. The targets included a number of London-area hospitals, law offices, bank headquarters and branch offices as well as government agencies.
According to NAID board member Lloyd Williams of Nottingham, U.K.-based Shredall Ltd., “The instructions to the investigators were quite explicit. They were not to go to extraordinary lengths or breach any laws when examining the trash. We hired them to simply look in the bin to see what any passerby might find.”
Overall, 44 percent of the institutions, each with a legal burden to protect personal information, were found to be casually discarding personal information, NAID says.
According to the study findings:
- One private hospital was found to have discarded the medical records of 70 patients, which included their names, addresses and details of their treatments.
- At a London law firm, a 20-page document detailing the case of a young woman with mental health problems currently in foster care was found on the pavement in a trash bag. The commercial garbage of all four law firms that were subject to investigation contained personal client details.
- Outside of a national drug store chain, trash was found to contain more than 20 prescription labels, including details such as patients’ names, addresses and details of the medication prescribed. Some also included doctors’ names, patients’ dates of birth and information on future requirements for medication.
“It is a matter of priorities,” Williams says of the cause for such disregard of clients’ personal data. “Employers do not stress the importance of data protection to frontline staff. The emphasis is on productivity and not security. It is simply not productive to stand by a small, slow office shredder destroying documents.”
Stephen Anderson of Crown Intelligence, who carried out the study, says, “It’s shocking to know that these firms regularly break the law. We couldn’t believe some of the personal information we found just dumped in public rubbish bins that leave people wide open to identity fraud if it fell into the wrong hands.”
He adds, “It wasn’t like we found single pieces of paper with a careless note here and there. In most cases there were complete documents, emails, letters, computer printouts and reports in full.”
NAID says it is not releasing the names of the organizations that were subject to the investigation.
“Releasing the names would actually be a disservice to the public,” Williams says. “If we make the issue about the bad behavior of a couple of dozen organizations, we will lose sight of the real issue. The real issue is how widespread the problem is. It makes no sense to try to isolate a handful of institutions when on any given day one out of three organizations is doing the same thing.”
The National Association of Information Destruction is a U.S.-based nonprofit industry organization representing 1,800 secure data destruction service providers around the world.
Total Training Services Releases 2012 “Shreducation” Schedule
Spartanburg, S.C.-based Total Training Services has announced that it will conduct seven Shred School seminars in 2012. The company also will host its annual Sales Retreat and Owners Forum in Orlando, Fla., Oct. 17-18, 2012, as well as monthly online Shredding the Competition Sales Workshops.
All Shred School seminars take place in Spartanburg, about an hour south of Charlotte, N.C. The first seminar was held in January. The remaining dates for 2012 are:
- Feb. 22-24;
- April 25-27 (Sales Boot Camp);
- June 6-8;
- Aug. 22-24 (Sales Boot Camp II);
- Nov. 14-16; and
- Dec. 12-14.
“The Sales Booth Camp Shred Schools will be customized for sales professionals in this industry,” Ray Barry of Total Training Services says. “We will go into detail on all of the tools needed for them to succeed and how to coach them to become sales champions.”
The Fifth Annual Sales Retreat & Owners Forum in October features two tracks: one for sales professionals and one for owners and managers.
More information is available from www.shredschool.com.
Allshred Services Sponsors Community Shred Event
For the second consecutive year, Allshred Services, Maumee, Ohio, has sponsored a community shred event in support of Lucas County (Ohio) Children Services’ 2011 “Give the Best Gift Ever” holiday gift-drive campaign.
Businesses and individuals could shred five boxes or bags of confidential documents per person for free with the donation of a new toy or gift card.
With the support of community residents, Allshred delivered more than 150 toys and gift cards to Lucas Country Children Services Dec. 13.
OSHA Recognizes Cintas Document Management Facility
Cintas Document Management, headquartered in Cincinnati, has announced that its Fremont, Calif., document management facility has been named an Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) Voluntary Protection Program (VPP) Star site. The VPP designation is the agency’s highest recognition for the practice of, and commitment to, occupational safety and health.
Cintas says it is the first document management services provider in the country to receive the VPP Star designation. The official ceremony was held Nov. 11 at Cintas’ Fremont facility, which offers on- and off-site destruction services to the California Bay area. The company applied for VPP certification in 2007.
Hal Stansbury, general manager of Cintas Document Management in Fremont, said, “Today is an achievement because this location has accomplished the toughest VPP certification in the country. Achieving this is a journey to ensure the most important thing—that each of us returns home safely to our families every day.”
Stansbury says Cintas’ Fremont document destruction plant was not only the first shredding company in the country to receive the VPP standard but also only the 81st company in California to receive VPP certification.
California OSHA recognizes facilities with exceptional safety and health programs through the California Voluntary Protection Program Star (Cal/VPP Star) certification. Achieving VPP Star requires the completion of a Cal/OSHA audit that is designed to assess the dedication management and employees have for maintaining a safe and healthful workplace.
The process to become VPP certified took Cintas’ Fremont location four years, Stansbury says, and required multiple audits by representatives from the California OSHA office.
The final audit was performed by five auditors spending one week at the facility, ultimately interviewing every employee at the plant.
Five additional Cintas Document Management facilities are pursuing VPP Star certification, the company says.
Cintas’ Portland, Ore., document management facility was recognized by OSHA’s Safety and Health Achievement Recognition Program (SHARP) in 2010.
Shred 360 Acquires Secure Shred
Two South Carolina shredding companies—Shred 360 and Secure Shred—have merged under the name Shred 360. Statewide headquarters for the merged operations will be Shred 360’s facility in Columbia, S.C.
The merger was completed in December 2011. According to a news release issued by Shred 360, the merger has created the largest locally owned, certified information destruction company in South Carolina.
John Anderson and James Christie founded Shred 360, and Mallory Edwards founded Secure Shred and serves as president of the company.
Edwards says the two companies found a niche in providing local companies with superior service. “Shred 360 and Secure Shred spend a lot of time and energy focusing on our customers,” he continues. “We are not going to sacrifice that foundation; it’s just the way we do business.”
Anderson adds, “That’s why we liked Secure Shred. Their attention to service is exactly how we do things.”
Christie says the merger puts the companies in a better position to compete in the marketplace. “We are providing a stronger company that will be better for our customers,” he says.
Shred 360 is AAA certified for on-site and off-site destruction of print media and hard drives by the National Association for Information Destruction. For more than five years, the company has provided destruction, records storage, scanning and e-scrap recycling services.
Proshred Recognizes Baltimore Franchise
Proshred has recognized its Baltimore/Washington, D.C., franchise, owned and managed by Martin Fisher, with the “Growth Award.” The award is given to a Proshred franchisee with the highest absolute, annual revenue growth compared with other franchisees in its category.
Kasia Pawluk, Proshred CFO, says, “Martin and his team have done an incredible job of growing their sales by more than $200,000 in one year. This great accomplishment has been the result of exceptional customer service and dedicated sales efforts focused on educating clients on the necessity of securely destroying confidential information.”
Proshred offers mobile destruction services.