What does this play on words mean? Well we are accustomed to seeing the lock. Something that you see and can insert a key or push buttons or insert a card into. So, what is a No Lock. This is where you do not see any outward appearance of any locking device.
These types of devices will start to appear more on the doors of businesses and homes. You may see a small plate or dark colored small glass on the front door or maybe nothing.
So how the does locking device operate. First of all, the actual locking device will still be there behind the door. It will have a locking bolt and a motor or solenoid that will move the bolt from the locked to unlocked position and back again. It may even have a thumb turn on the inside so that it can be operated mechanically.
Operating the door from the outside can be done in several ways. For high security installations biometrics may be used, either finger prints, eye scans, palm scans or any combination of the three. These would usually be found in government, military or very high security installations. For commercial use you will find finger print scans or card access. For card access, RFID or Bluetooth will be used in between the card and a certain position on the door. For home use a smart phone will be used with an app that acts as the “Key”.
Any of these options will provide access control. The administrator will be able to grant or take away access immediately. There will also be a history of who operated that door and when. This history can be rolled over or it can be archived for an indefinite amount of time. There can also be timed entry where access is granted only during a specified time or time period, such as between the hours of 8am and 5pm.
So it appears the “No Lock… Lock” will be in our future. There will be no outward visibility of a lock or where it may be. This should provide much better security as there will be no outside lock device that can be attacked. These locks will provide very good access control. They will appear in commercial applications first, then when the price gets affordable, they will appear in the residential market.
