With the semester starting, we are welcomed with the sweltering heat and the dorm life. One particular interaction that caught my interest were the gates by entrance the of the residential buildings. To enter into the dorms, one would need to swipe their NYUAD ID card against the gate to enter. Near these gates was stationed a security guard. The purpose of this gate was to ensure people who are not NYUAD students without proper procedures and identification from entering into these dorms. If more than one person attempted to pass the same gate without swiping, an alarm would go off. The gate in it of itself is not particularly tall: one could vault over it quite easily. However, the purpose of the security guard stationed nearby is to ensure that this does not happen. Additionally, there are security cameras stationed by the entrance to monitor who enters. To leave the dorms, one would simply walk by the sensor by the gate and the door would open; a card is not needed to leave the dorm. This three way system seems like an adequate system that uses both human and machine processes.

While moving my belongings stationed in the storage units into my new dorm, I encountered an interesting interaction with these gates. To transport my items, I used a trolley. While leaving the dorm, the trolley has to be in front of you or else it would ring an alarm (which I unfortunately triggered by pulling the trolley behind me). The issue with the gate system was that to leave the dorm, you would first need to stand in front of the sensor and then move behind the trolley and push it through the opened gates. Failure to do so would result in the gates to close and hit the object behind you, triggering an alarm. I find this process to be inefficient, however I can fathom why this would be implemented. The sensor is around waist-height meaning that it would be unable to detect objects below it (such as the trolley). If this was not implemented and you pulled an object behind you that was below the sensor while moving through the gate, the sensor would be unable to detect the trolley and assume the person has traveled past the gate but not the trolley. By making it so that the person walks through last, the sensor can read when to shut the gates and not trigger an unnecessary alarm. Another interaction with the gates is a human one. Sometimes while carrying things, it would be difficult to pull out your ID card to swipe in. You can ask the security guard to open the gates for you without swiping in. The human interaction is one that can be exploited. One could ask the security guard to open the gate for someone who is not an NYUAD student by having them carry things and/or handing them your card while you carry things. Whether or not this works completely would require further testing. There may or may not be a scanning of the ID to check the faces of the card and the person. If so, this exploitation would be harder to pull off. 

But yeah, yay to security and gates?