Visit San Fran at your own risk. Here we have a major firm, holding a conference, telling the attendees to be careful, San Fran is not safe.
“New to Dreamforce in recent years is a subtle but significant shift in how Salesforce addresses security in the city for its attendees. In Dreamforce’s FAQ, among standard security tips about staying alert and keeping bags, wallets and phones close, is one novel tip: “Upon leaving Dreamforce events at Moscone, be sure to remove your badge.”
It’s a technically sound, albeit peculiar, suggestion: Dreamforce attendees have to blend in with the rest of the city, even though the rest of the city is well-aware that downtown San Francisco is flooded with Dreamforce attendees.
To be safe, Salesforce should have held its conference in Texas or Florida. Maybe if people refuse to attend a conference in a War Zone that has no police, the company would change locations.
Salesforce has unusual safety advice for Dreamforce attendees in San Francisco
Joshua Bote, SFGATE, 9/16/22
After a COVID-19-induced hiatus, Dreamforce, tech giant Salesforce’s annual conference, is landing once again in San Francisco — and with it, an influx of out-of-towners.
New to Dreamforce in recent years is a subtle but significant shift in how Salesforce addresses security in the city for its attendees. In Dreamforce’s FAQ, among standard security tips about staying alert and keeping bags, wallets and phones close, is one novel tip: “Upon leaving Dreamforce events at Moscone, be sure to remove your badge.”
It’s a technically sound, albeit peculiar, suggestion: Dreamforce attendees have to blend in with the rest of the city, even though the rest of the city is well-aware that downtown San Francisco is flooded with Dreamforce attendees.
“It is our priority to maintain a safe environment for everyone attending the event,” Allen Tsai, Salesforce’s director of corporate communications, said in a statement to SFGATE. “We implement security best practices, partner with law enforcement and use bag checks and metal detectors where appropriate.”
About 150,000 people, both in-person and online, are anticipated to attend Dreamforce. (A company spokesperson did not break out this data to SFGATE, so how many people will attend in-person remains unclear.)
Based on an archived version of Dreamforce’s FAQ, the suggestion to hide Dreamforce badges was introduced with Dreamforce’s 2019 bash. But the line about removing your badge — along with the other security measures — was relatively concealed in a question titled: “What tips should I know about visiting San Francisco?” That line of questioning appears to de-emphasize any security concerns of attending Dreamforce, even if the messaging is entirely the same.
Salesforce, after pausing its most significant annual event for two years, is arguably putting a heightened focus on security for this year’s Dreamforce. While safety has proven to be a national talking point in San Francisco, San Francisco police crime data shows that crime overall declined in 2021 compared with pre-pandemic years past (with the significant exception being homicides, with 15 more reported in 2021 than in 2019). When comparing this year so far to the same time period in 2021 — Jan. 1 to Sept. 11, the latest data point provided by San Francisco police — crime has increased by 8.5%, but is still down 8% compared with 2019.
