Day: May 10, 2019

Successfully recording video from hundreds of security cameras 24 hours a day, seven days a week without losing a single frame is a very complex challenge. If that wasn’t tough enough, your system also has to allow for future growth and show that it’s reducing your claims and/ or shortening response times. Video surveillance is becoming more and more important as perceived and actual physical security threats increase worldwide. Hardware and solutions proliferate even as budgets have flattened or turned downward. Whether you’ve been a security professional for decades or your IT department just inherited video surveillance, there’s a morass of technologies to wade through to find the right components. This white paper focuses on how to specify video storage, how video is unique in the world, and why systems must be carefully thought out to ensure crucial data isn’t lost. Central to the discussion is a review of the trio of storage technologies – Direct Attached Storage (DAS), Network Attached Storage (NAS), and Storage Area Network (SAN). Before diving into the details of each of these technologies, let us look at some broader considerations to have in mind while writing video surveillance system requirements for your building, complex or campus. Important considerations for building and upgrading surveillance systems You spend hours Googling ‘surveillance systems’ or an entire week at a trade show and easily come away confounded by the plethora of security hardware, software and services. In this first section, we outline the problem and a few considerations to keep in mind while developing the requirements for your physical security system. The conundrum of surveillance Thirty years ago, you simply went out and bought some cameras, coaxial cable and a VCR. Now, all the components are digital. The surveillance conundrum is clear to anyone who follows the news: Threats (real and perceived) are growing. In response, the public, private companies and govern ments are demanding more and better physical security. Surveillance options are growing in number and capability. The growing camera population (with ever higher resolution) is creating a flood of data. Cameras never stop recording and what they ‘see’ must be stored somehow. Despite event-driven spikes, security budgets have generally declined in recent years. A growing demand for surveillance Beyond public security, there’s an ever-growing demand for video surveillance inside and around banks, casinos, school campuses, hospitals, hotels, transportation hubs and highways, railways, harbors, factories, power plants, refineries etc. Of course, many of these systems can serve a dual purpose such as speeding up ferry departures based on traffic conditions, remotely-monitoring trucks as they’re being loaded, or alerting hotel staff of a VIP’s arrival. “With the edge getting smarter, it is the time that the backend Infrastructure gets smarter too. With ML & AI being deployed extensively, data is the ‘new gold’ and its reliability needs to be addressed as well” – Prakash Prabhu Regional Sales Director – SAARC, Pivot3 Analytics: The shift to digital transforms watchers into actors Sci-fi and action films may offer windows into the future of surveillance, but today you can tap into the wealth of information found in the real world. When tied to biometric reads (such as iris scanners) and using behavioral analysis algorithms, video surveillance systems can now monitor numerous real-time scenes and automatically respond with say – a coupon to a shopper who shows interest in a particular shirt, or an alert to unusual activity in a subway station. With automation, human eyes aren’t needed for the mind-numbing task of watching a bank of video monitors. Personnel can instead focus on stopping a bad guy in the act, correcting a problem, anticipating a need, or providing a service. In fact, advanced users are turning their surveillance data from cost centers into cash. Digital equipment and software The shift to digital has also changed the way video surveillance systems are built. Instead of endless ‘home runs’ of coaxial and power cables from a control room to each camera, IP (Internet Protocol) cameras and monitors can be networked just like computers. Cameras can even be powered by the same Ethernet cabling that transmits their video data. Today’s video surveillance systems typically have at least one computer server running video management software (VMS). The VMS enables users to control the cameras and monitors, as well as search archived ‘footage’ in storage. Storage can either be inside the VMS server (as DAS in a NVR) or in a separate storage device on the network (NAS or SAN). Computer processing and storage infrastructure software underlies the VMS application layer, ensuring that all your equipment is working as it should, with little or no administrative burden. You can also run all the software and storage on virtual machines. Ever-improving cameras mean ever-growing data streams Whether you are securing a small office or large factory campus, now that cameras are digital, you’re able to take advantage of Moore’s Law and watch prices droping as sophistication soars. However, a lower price also suggests the temptation of buying more. Better capabilities (like high-definition) offer better detail in a wider range of light conditions. With a 180° or 360° view, one camera can do the work of several analog eyes. For example, the wide angle can enable you to watch an entire parking lot, then pan or zoom electronically to read a license plate or see a face. The downside is such cameras require a huge amount of network bandwidth and storage. As the name suggests, each IP camera has its own IP address and connects to the network with a standard RJ-45 jack. It often has a built-in web server, email client, FTP client and supports Power-over-Ethernet (PoE) standards. As IP cameras become more sophisticated, they’re able to stream to more than one destinations; perform more processing and analytics; and make adjustments for changing environmental conditions (such as rain or fog) and lighting changes; and reduce frame rates if a scene is unchanged (thereby lowering bandwidth and storage loads). System performance is measured in terms of how many…