Video Surveillance

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Advances in IP video technology have expanded the use of video surveillance from the closed circuit television (CCTV) application, to applications that can improve virtually every aspect of a business – streamlining operations to increased protection and safety of facilities, inventory and staff.

After numerous robberies of convenience stores, some tragically ending in the murder of staff or customers, a number of states enacted legislation to encourage store owners to institute security measures.

As IP-based video systems continue to gain widespread popularity in the video surveillance market, one of the benefits is the ability to capture high-resolution images through megapixel video. Also emerging is use of the HDTV standards that are prevalent in the consumer video market. The images produced by this new generation of cameras are often collectively referred to as high-definition (HD) or as megapixel images. Because the terms HD and megapixel both indicate an improved level of imaging performance compared to traditional analog images, they are often thought to be the same. But, there is a difference.

The development and deployment of video surveillance technologies continues to gain momentum, and keeping pace with this success are the powerful advances being made in camera imaging. 

As surveillance video has grown increasingly popular, it’s popped up in more places. It watches the cashier in retail stores. It captures license plates as cars enter and exit parking lots. 

There are more than 4,300 security video cameras in the Big Apple’s busy subway system. But after an investigation last year of a violent stabbing attack lacking any images for follow up, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) took inventory and discovered that about half of them did not work, or recording was faulty, or the lens or dome was dirty or spray painted, or the field of view had changed and the cameras not. 

At the ISC West conference in 2009, I saw a great keynote speech delivered by Lt. General Kenneth Minihan, former Director of both the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) and the National Security Agency (NSA). 

Hospital and healthcare settings offer many ways to use video surveillance. The security needs of these institutions reflect the life-or-death work they do and also a volatile environment where emotions can run high.