I just read this story about a colocation facility that was robbed for the fourth time in just two years, and I had to laugh at the absurdity of it.

C I Host provides more than 250,000 consumers and small- and medium-sized business in 190 countries with managed web hosting, dedicated server and colocation services.

According to one report, “During the robbery, C I Host’s night manager was repeatedly tazered and struck with a blunt instrument. After violently attacking the manager, the intruders stole equipment belonging to C I Host and its customers…At least 20 data servers were stolen, said Patrick Camden, deputy director of news affairs for the Chicago Police Department.”

The company’s Family Colocation offering promises to house equipment in a secured 144 sq. ft suite inside one of C I Host’s data centers.

The website states “Your machine will be housed inside a SECURED (I didn’t put the caps on, they did) shared co-location area.”

According to Migration Solutions, acts of theft, fraud and vandalism in the data center are three times more likely to be an ‘inside job’ than perpetrated by someone who’s unconnected with the facility. Furthermore, around 65% of data center security incidents are driven by malicious intent rather than economic gain, and perpetrators are normally disgruntled current or ex-employees, Migration Solutions reported.

The fact that this facility, which is not some two-bit operation, has seen four robberies in such a short period of time seems ridiculous. I am interested in feedback from the industry on this.

Here at AFCOM’s Data Center World show in Dallas, I went to a session on data center EPOs, which is short for Emergency Power Off. Basically it’s that big red button by the exit door in your data center that you should never, ever touch.

Better yet, don’t even put one in. Yes, you heard that right. The speaker, Richard Sawyer from EYP Misson Critical Facilities, said that some data centers don’t even need an EPO. It all relates to the difference between codes and standards as set out by the National Fire Protection Agency (NFPA). Codes you have to follow; standards, not so much.

So if you don’t have cables underneath a raised floor, have IT equipment cable boxes secured to your floor and don’t state that you’re following NFPA 75, you don’t need an EPO. Sawyer also went into how an EPO should be designed (think rotary switch instead of a button and with lots of horns and lights attached when you’re about to turn it) and what some are doing to try to change the federal codes around data center EPOs.

As part of his presentation, Sawyer talked about some of the disasters he has seen out there with data center EPOs. Among them: one EPO located directly behind a copy machine, so that if someone lifted the lid up, the button could get hit; another one had a Post-It Note attached that read, “Do Not Touch.” Sawyer relayed one story of a service technician who backed into an EPO while unpacking equipment in the data center. The cost: two mainframes, two minicomputers and 20 other servers failed; there was a two-hour outage; and the company ended up spending $100,000 to upgrade its EPO.

Tell us about your data center EPO disasters (or successes) in the comments section.