Red Five, founded in 2004 by Kris Coleman (who worked for both the CIA and the FBI), is providing safe rooms, resiliency planning, online privacy, and cybersecurity; and practical self-sufficiency skills to their clients. Kris’s motto is “Ensuring bad things don’t happen to good people.”
Read our interview with Kris below to learn about Red Five and bespoke privacy, security, and resiliency solutions for your private family, estate, and business.
Acoustic Architects: What was the inception of Red Five?
Kris Coleman: I left my government job to consult privately, and to rebuild high-security programs for aircraft, yachts, and family homes. After about a year, I identified a need for innovative, high-end security, resiliency, and privacy support for families needing confidentiality. With that focus, I started my own company to make sure bad things didn’t happen to good people who weren’t prepared. We are now able to provide them with the best services to protect what matters most to them.
What is the biggest challenge for a security company like yours?
Educating the clients that don’t think they are susceptible to threats. Most wealthy families don’t consider themselves a target. However, information is available with a quick internet search, and people tend to give up their information readily, therefore almost anyone can be located and targeted with little effort. People are often unaware that their online activity can reveal so much personal information, and make them and their family vulnerable – either at home or while traveling. Our team keeps up with new technologies and stays ahead of the threats so that families can protect their privacy, their identity, and their livelihood.
Safe Rooms
Can you walk us through a typical safe room design?
The family needs an assessment as the rooms are built-to-threat and subsequently designed to protect specific family members from that threat for a certain amount of time. We consider oxygen/air circulation, fireproofing, ballistic protection, and tactical planning. When coming up with the designs, we use all the skills from our training and work in the CIA and FBI. Those tactics are applied with structure, technology, engineering, and materials; and then we provide operations plans and training to the family on how to use the safe room.
What is the most important consideration in building a safe room?
Practicality – simple, proven strategies. People can be paralyzed by fear and under immense stress when they need to use the safe room so we ensure our programs can be used under those conditions. Simple plans are needed to be successful. The rooms can handle the threats, are cleverly hidden (usually in plain sight) for operational security, and offer our clients peace of mind.
Can you share a story about a specific project or theoretical project? Of course, without sharing any identifying information.
We designed security for a new large home in South Florida. The objective was to keep paparazzi and trespassers from coming off the public beach onto the property. The owners wanted a barrier without visual obstruction. We considered the geography and the weather of the area and came up with a water feature that actually contained water cannons. Sensor technology triggers a system that warns trespassers they’ve entered private property. If they don’t leave, the water cannons provide an additional delay that buys the security team enough time to assess the threat and, if necessary, allows the family to get to their safe room.
On the other side of the US, we designed a safe room for a California family in a remote wildfire zone. They have an extensive art collection and needed a way to preserve the art collection and have access to safety in the threat of home invasion or fire. So we designed a wine cellar and safe room underground. The wine cellar, functional and enjoyable, also provided a place to which they could move the art in case of a threatening wildfire. This made the client and the insurance company really happy.
Digital Security + Privacy
Tell us about your online reputation management and social media monitoring,
Clients value their privacy, and there is a persistent threat to information as of late. All homes and devices are very vulnerable, and none of the digital assistants are secured. We take a holistic approach to protecting our clients and their information. A privacy audit lets clients know if there is a vulnerability in their own home or internet of Things within the home. We also look at online and social media accounts. Most people don’t realize what social accounts are still open, and how that information can impact their personal security and privacy. We can limit vulnerabilities, suppress things that are negative, and amplify those that are positive.
And what about dark web monitoring?
The Dark web doesn’t work like the rest of the web. It is very fluid with sites popping up and disappearing quickly. Identity and information theft happen quickly and our clients sometimes make it easy for the bad guys, but finding the stolen information and getting it taken down is more difficult. We use a trained analyst to search for our clients’ information on the deep and dark web. If and when personal and/or compromising information is located, we work with clients to remove the information and offer tips to limit their exposure in the future.
What does the future look like for Red Five?
The future is bright for Red Five. There is no shortage of need for security, privacy, and resiliency services. Especially of late, our society as a whole has a lot of concerns, and many private families are worried about civil unrest and disorder. Red Five wants people to survive and thrive. We’re here to help our clients be ready and vigilant in fighting off the bad guys to preserve their legacy for generations to come.
The Acoustic Architects Connection
When did you first meet Acoustic Architects?
It was about six years ago while working in Florida together on a large, challenging project.
How are you and Acoustic Architects working symbiotically to meet each other’s needs?
We do weird well and tackle the abnormal. Acoustic Architects can handle weird and challenging technology projects, but when things get really complicated in the security field, they can call us.
What do you value the most about collaborating with Acoustic Architects?
It’s a combo of expertise, precision, and the pace of their work. They know the clients need to move quickly, decisively, and not waste money. The Acoustic Architects’ team is trustworthy, on time, and cutting edge. Red Five brings expertise from our time with the government, but also from working with unique private families for the last 15 years.
Responsive Living, the term coined by Acoustic Architects founders, Aaron Flint and Spencer Hauldren, is the concept of seamlessly enhancing the client’s unique lifestyle using smart home technology. Responsive Living allows you to interact with your space via touch input, voice command, and predictive automation, placing you in full control of your home. If you would like to learn more about security solutions for your home, feel free to connect with us. We will be happy to schedule a demo with you.
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