I see many comments here be like "security is important for google, so paying guards more is a wise move". That isn't really true. If you want to keep something

I see many comments here be like "security is important for google, so paying guards more is a wise move". That isn't really true. If you want to keep something safe the real question isn't if your employee wants to abuse you, but if he can. Security is about being sure that damage that can be made by every single person you entrusted with access to something is reasonably low. Because if somebody can blow you up, him being your own employee and not a contractor, or paying him nice wage doesn't guarantee enough. Consider Snowden. Now about wages. I'm not sure why I'm saying such obvious things on HN, but there's some visible ignorance in comments on that topic. Developers aren't paid more than cleaners because being developer is somehow better by itself. Wages are dictated by market, so the question is if you can find somebody who can do the same work while being paid less. Of course I don't know what specific purpose will serve these security guys hired by google, but if we're talking about something like sitting all day long watching nobody enters using other tools than his NFC card then answer is definitely yes, finding a guy who can do that is easier than finding a guy who can write efficient js or something like that. I do think that hiring your own security staff is convenient (and I'm a bit surprised it wasn't the case before — I suppose it isn't like they are founding their own Blackwater), but it doesn't seem to be as important as some journalists are implying and sure it isn't about social equality.