Such arguments, already proposed in previous editions of Security Management Today, have to win over the sceptics. Sceptics who question IP video's significance in the context of several unresolved issues. For instance, some IT managers have concerns that the data will swamp their systems with its bandwidth demands. Others worry that this technology trend may actually see IT Departments taking control of surveillance systems away from the security manager.
Fears have also been expressed about the potential lack of security of any images transmitted over the Internet, as well as the Data Protection Act-related implications of allowing more staff to process surveillance pictures.
It's certain that the debate will progress apace in forthcoming months as more and more on-site case studies begin to reveal how some of these issues have been addressed in practice. Specific pointers were offered at the recent IIPSEC Exhibition and Conference, the industry's first dedicated event on the subject held at the National Motorcycle Museum in Birmingham.
Security Management Today listened in to see how end users are already benefiting from so-called 'e-surveillance' and other applications using systems that operate over Ethernet-based Local and Wide Area Networks ('What's the SP with IP?', Security Management Today, September 2002, pp40-43).
Surveillance on the M25
During the course of the last three years, surveillance of London's M25 orbital motorway has 'migrated' from a total of five separate analogue systems – each of which was overseen by police Control Centres operating independently from one another – into a single, digital, networked solution.
An ageing and inflexible infrastructure, explained product manager Mark Bouldin of IP video specialist Telindus, had compounded a lack of systems integration and communication between the respective camera systems and Control Centres. Faced with increasing traffic, the Highways Agency realised the need for improving on the existing carriageways, thereby helping to reduce congestion and improve the ratio of incident avoidance. The move is part of an overall Government policy to make better use of existing roadway infrastructures throughout the country.
Telindus was commissioned to help tackle problems with M25 surveillance, including a piecemeal (original) analogue system which was approaching obsolescence in certain areas. Some sections of the motorway had no CCTV coverage whatsoever, while in other sections it was limited. There were 200 cameras surveying the motorway, but an expansion to 380 cameras was needed for sufficient coverage.
A major drawback to that expansion lay in the existing fibre optic system's inability to cope with these extra cameras without substantial investment in additional transmission capacity. A resilient communications system was required, which rather counted against continuing with any form of analogue technology.
The solution lay in making more efficient use of the existing fibre optic network by using digital transmission. Up to 51,000 cameras can now be run through the new system, which has a dual loop (so that if one network should fail everything is backed up on an alternative fibre ring). Multicast routing enables the five police Control Centres to simultaneously view images from the same camera for the first time. Moreover, should a power failure shut down any of the M25 Control Centres, its work can be temporarily carried out from any of the others.
Bouldin described other benefits realised by the system's installation. For example, more efficient despatch of incident response units such as fire and ambulance vehicles – owing to the Control Centres' collective ability to effectively see right around the motorway using the additional cameras. Surrey Police have accordingly been able to cut their incident response units from eight to five, and redeploy the spare vehicles elsewhere. The average incident response time has been reduced by over 50%. Pretty impressive stuff.
Welcome news about IP?
Lessons learned from two very different digital IP CCTV case studies – one covering The Evening Telegraph's large Derby-based evening newspaper plant (see photograph, above) and the publishing group therein, the other devised for a major international mobile telephone concern – were espoused by Keith Bloodworth of Computer Networks Ltd (CNL).
More than 70 serious business interruptions were occurring every week in the telephone company's 8,000 square foot telecoms server room. In certain cases, these outages had shut down the operation of a Call Centre employing some 200 members of staff. To remedy the problem, which was being caused by inefficient work practices among engineers, CNL recommended the installation of 25 Axis 2120 IP cameras running over five 'virtual' networks. These are powered by a quad Compaq server, with an uninterruptible power supply as back-up. A 500 Gb RAID 5 storage system provides a secure method of storing the computer data.
The digital nature of network systems, with logging of incidents on to an events database, enables operators to instantly track back to them at the click of a mouse. This facility also allows monitoring station managers to check on their staff membersR
Bloodworth describes the end results as "outstanding". Careless errors dropped to zero in the first few weeks after the cameras' installation, and it became clear that the units were acting as a deterrent to sloppy working practices among the engineers which had blighted the operation. There was a knock-on boost in morale among the Call Centre staff when they discovered that their own work was no longer being interrupted by these outages. As a result, the client estimates that a return on investment was achieved within a week.
Turning to the Derbyshire newspaper plant owned by The Evening Telegraph, Bloodworth described how a decision to extensively refurbish and modernise the operational plant on this half mile-long site offered an opportunity to upgrade the security there as well. These improvements have included upgraded surveillance of the building, loading bays and other areas such as the car park. CNL's client didn't want to see any coaxial cable because a network system was being installed throughout the plant, and the security measures had to use this infrastructure instead.
CNL recommended the installation of Milestone X-Protect IP cameras running on a switched network. Some existing cameras have been linked-in to the network by using video servers, bringing the total number of surveillance units up to 27. These are now capable of covering all areas except the car park, which provides space for around 350 vehicles (and is used for overflow parking when Derby County FC are playing their home matches at Pride Park).
The most cost-effective method of monitoring such a large area was to install a column-mounted PTZ dome camera in the centre of the car park. Power to drive the camera was available at this spot, though a network connection wasn't. The solution involved a wireless connection from the camera to a fixed point on the plant building where a network feed was established.
Bloodworth added that this camera transmits images over the wireless connection at around 11 frames per second, and that a patrol sequence has been programmed for the unit involving motion detection software. These measures have necessarily meant a reduction in the number of cameras that would otherwise have been needed to monitor the car park.
As well as being used for security purposes during normal operation, the network enables plant managers to dial-in to the site for remote investigation and monitoring. CNL reports that its client has calculated a return on investment for this particular installation at less than one year. Contributing towards this were factors such as the reduced installation cost from using a network-based system, in addition to resultant efficiency improvements at the plant.
For instance, recorded surveillance images of the loading bays have been used to demonstrate £16,000 worth of damage caused by reversing accidents involving large lorries delivering paper supplies to the plant.
Making use of existing LANs
According to Sirrus' chairman and technical director Mike Holt, network-based monitoring has proven beneficial at a large aluminium smelting site – where a mix of newly-installed Internet Protocol cameras and existing CCTV units now share a corporate LAN.
The surveillance measures have been introduced at the 24-hour operational plant – which is situated on a 50-acre site and employs approximately 3,000 staff – to assist with process management duties and help safeguard the Health and Safety of employees in this particularly hazardous working environment. Sirrus' client wanted to achieve a mix of related aims with the system: to provide security for people and processes, observe working practices and monitor lapses in important safety procedures (with their attendant insurance implications).
Other specification choices included the provision of multi-point viewing on the production line such that managers can then see other parts of the huge plant from the nearest PC. Expandability (or scalability) was also a priority – if the initial trial proved to be successful then the client wished to 'scale up' the equipment.
Holt described the difficulty of laying cable with the plant, a procedure that would require costly plant shutdowns. With this in mind, Sirrus suggested a solution involving the use of the plant's existing LAN, to which CCTV cameras are connected using video servers as well as new IP units. Picture recording is handled by a 350 Gb storage unit, equivalent to around two weeks of 24-hours-per-day timelapse recording of one frame per second from each camera.
To provide the managers with views around the plant, browser software has been installed which brings up images at the click of a mouse on the relevant camera icon. Other video console stations provide access to both live and archived video.
Mobile networked video can provide an additional means of protecting Cash-in-Transit vehicles. Besides the deterrent value of these systems, real-time recording courtesy of externally-mounted cameras may be triggered following the activation of panic alar
Mobile networked surveillance
Drawing conclusions from four practical applications, Dedicated Micros' Robert Bell summarised networked video as enabling users "to watch anything from anywhere, at any time and from any location".
Bell, Dedicated Micros' network video server product manager, progressed with the audience from a small nightclub installation through to a medium-sized security project involving a central monitoring station, before revealing how a large casino in Australia has deployed IP technology to its advantage. Bell concluded his presentation with some salient comment on the potential for mobile networked video.
Firstly setting the scene on the nightclub management's requirements for its networked surveillance system, Bell described them as "varied and wide-ranging". They included a need to monitor access to the building while it's unoccupied. Managers also wanted to survey the premises during normal working hours, as well as provide video support for their security team (including door supervisors who may become embroiled in incidents). There was also a requirement for evidential proof of any actions that occur during such incidents, in addition to routine monitoring of customers waiting to come into the club.
Inside the premises, the client was keen to keep an eye on the cash tills to pick up on potential employee thefts and fraud, and provide evidential proof of this occurring. Camera links to the tills' EPOS system mean that managers can now be automatically notified over the network of any data exceptions that occur, allowing them to view such incidents using pre-programmed PTZ camera recordings activated by alarms. "Some nightclubs report that anything up to 80% of their shrinkage losses are staff-related," said Bell.
Besides security, the networked system is additionally used to assess customer traffic within the club and compare numbers and movement patterns from similar times on different days as a management tool to help improve business. Video motion detection on the fire doors also frees staff from the need for regular physical patrols to check them, since automatic incident reporting over the network now notifies managers of any doors being opened, etc.
IP and central stations
Moving on to describe the central monitoring station installation, Robert Bell noted that a networked surveillance solution allows his client to provide faster response to alarm incidents at customers' protected premises. It achieves this by automatically feeding the detail on each incoming incident around the network of monitoring PCs, from the initial operator to the next in turn and so on, until it finds the first member of staff who's free to deal with the situation.
Customers can also dial in to their own protected sites from a remote location, as well as being informed of any incidents and provided with images by the monitoring station to view purely for the purposes of visual verification. The digital nature of network systems, with logging of incidents on to an events database, enables operators to instantly track back to them at the click of a mouse. This facility also allows the monitoring station to check on (and demonstrate action taken by) its staff in response to each incident as an audit trail to show to the customer following an event.
Bell added that the network system installed at this monitoring station has brought with it knock-on benefits. For example, savings have been achieved in the number of mobile staff previously required to respond to false alarms at customers' premises. These benefits have been derived from factors such as remote visual verification of images by the monitoring station's customers.
Bell's final case study was an interesting description of security at the Crown Casino in Victoria, Australia – a 24/7 operation involving some 1,200 cameras which monitor everything from the car parks to the gaming tables, cash tills, fire exits and the VIP gaming area. Video footage from tills can be overlaid with till data and reviewed at any time by managers around the building. Exceptions can trigger alarms that are similarly picked up by staff at different locations for the purposes of response action.
'Tiered' access to the network system means that grades of staff may be restricted to viewing different cameras. For instance, Front-of-House employees may only view the images from units covering the car park and general security areas.
Concluding an informative presentation, Robert Bell reviewed potential applications for mobile networked video, including cameras already installed on buses and trains. GSM/GPRS technology can be used to remotely dial-in to a vehicle to check on any incidents and visually confirm its location. SMS devices may also be used to provide an alert if a vehicle deviates from its normal route.
Mobile networked video can also provide an additional means of protecting Cash-in-Transit vehicles. Besides the deterrent value of these surveillance systems, real-time recording courtesy of externally-mounted cameras may be triggered due to the activation of panic alarms by the vehicle's crew.
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