Surveillance

Surveillance on steroids: supercharge your CCTV with software

By Amelia Kwok | 14 August 2008

Can you teach an old dog new tricks? You can with IP-based CCTV! We look at how the latest surveillance software radically extends the ability to screen for unusual behaviour, detect unattended baggage and monitor access, among other capabilities.

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IP CCTV as second generation CCTV?

It would be unjust to treat IP cameras as a substitute to analog cameras. Inherently, it is much more than a standby to the conventional CCTV cameras. IP surveillance has opened up new opportunities for security that were previously impossible with the old technology; it is changing the way the security industry implements surveillance cameras.

According to Travis Jones, Security and Emergency Response Manager, Melbourne Airport in Australia, “Digital cameras are fast becoming the new standard. We are finding that using IP cameras is more the direction we are heading.”

The Senai International Airport in Malaysia has both a passenger terminal and a separate logistics and cargo complex, with plans to handle 2 million tons of cargo a year and become a regional logistics airport for South East Asia. “A completely new surveillance system has been installed in the passenger terminal together with an upgrade from the existing analog CCTV system to IP in the cargo complex,” says Kennedy Ayu, General Manager at the Senai International Airport. Ayu also adds that all the analog cameras at the airport have been replaced by IP cameras.

Similarly, at the Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi, India, traditional CCTV cameras have been replaced by digital high-resolution cameras. In total, 104 such cameras have already being put in place in the domestic terminal; the international terminal will also be equipped with 205 similar cameras by the end of 2008.

To be fair, analog cameras did serve its intended purpose and many organisations still continue to use them. It is cheaper to purchase than digital CCTV and possess superior compatiblity in terms of mixing and matching different camera brands into your existing surveillance system. The downside is analog cameras “do not provide much flexibility in managing the raw data,” says Terence Yap, CFO and vice chairman at CSST. “Also, traditional CCTV cameras are unable to support high bandwidth transmission, which can be challenging over long distances,” adds Yap. Lastly, it faces potential interference problems if you intend to install a wireless surveillance system; resulting signals cannot be encrypted which means unauthorised people can view the signals. This difficulty is illustrated in the case of Melbourne Airport. “Where analog cameras have to be deployed at a tricky location, they have to be connected to an encoder, which is nearer to the network port,” says Jones.

On the other hand, IP cameras have encryption built into them which provides for a more secure network, where interference does not pose a problem. “Network video cameras can encrypt the video signal sent through the network. It cannot be easily tampered with or viewed by unauthorised personnel. Video signal from an analog camera is usually transported over the network without encryption or authentication, which makes it easy for anyone to tamper with the signal,” says Yoshikazu Hirano, General Manager, Security Solutions Asia Pacific, Sony.

As the cameras act as their own network device, you can often take advantage of your existing network wiring infrastructure which makes for installation much easier. “IP solutions are also more scalable than analog systems. User can add more cameras, recorders and servers as you need them – simply by installing them on the IP network. With CCTV, user is limited by the reach of the analog cabling,” says Hirano at Sony.

“Analog cameras normally result in messy cabling when you add devices into the system,” says Mayumi Sakaguchi, spokesperson for JVC.

Also, they are suitable for remote surveillance areas. “IP CCTV will provide users with the ability to perform remote monitoring over a greater distance and also multiple locations,” says Yap at CSST.

The security team at the Senai International Airport chose to upgrade its existing analog cameras to IP cameras as the latter “allows operators to view and record video from any camera at any point on the network,” says Ayu.

“IP cameras can stream video to anywhere in the world. There is no geographical boundary of access. And multiple users can access the same video stream simultaneously,” says Hirano at Sony.

Furthermore, the solution allowed up to 30 days of video recording storage capabilities and a suite of tools for fast search and analysis of recorded footage. “Storage was a huge issue for us and IP cameras helped us solve this problem,” says Ayu.

However, all good things do come at a price. “An IP system is more scalable and flexible than an analog-based system. Everyone knows this, but it constricted people to embark on IP cameras because they still cost much more than analog ones. Also, it is difficult to have a wider bandwidth that is sufficient to process huge image data from surveillance cameras,” says Mayumi Sakaguchi, spokesperson for JVC.

Large premises such as airports still continue to use both analog and digital cameras. For example, a spokesman at the Sydney Airport said that both types of cameras are deployed as part of their security strategy.

Over at the Melbourne Airport, Jones cites valuable potential in using IP cameras. “Mainly due to the available management features for the cameras and ability to locate recorders in convenient and secure locations. This saves having to set up small secure locations for recorders close to cameras. Also the ability to record cameras to multiple locations allows disaster recovery recording offsite,” says Jones.

Under a federally funded grant programme, Vidient has been supplying video analysis service to the San Francisco airport in the US. Guy Morgante, VP of services at Vidient says a major problem with monitoring CCTV coverage currently is with the human sitting in front of multiple screens, often divided further into multiple camera views. “Anybody who has been in a control and command centre knows this is a huge problem. How alert can you be, monitoring these cameras for hours?” says Morgante.

The latest generations of IP cameras represent unprecedented standards of image clarity and data acquisition, with many of the high-end units performing better than the human eye under poor lighting conditions. “However, no matter how good the picture, in the end, effective use of any form of visual monitoring falls to the interpretation of what is seen,” says Dr Gareth Evans at the University of Durham in the UK.

Using CCTV software for intelligent analysis of data

With digital CCTV equipped with video analytic software at security checkpoints, they can capture and can flag up any suspicious events, which helps solve the issue of human error. Most commonly, the cameras can detect for individuals ‘tailgating’ - following another person through an opened door - or static objects, either in secure areas or at kerbside. Morgante says “the cameras can detect if two people pass through an open door, and can even differentiate between one very large person and two smaller people.”

The most advanced surveillance solutions on the market today have true behavior recognition capabilities. Intelligent software analysis is helpful in providing advanced warning which will in turn alert a security team, enabling the detection of suspicious actions that threaten safety and security in real-time, alerting the appropriate security staff for effective, immediate and efficient response. For example, in a shopping centre or at the airport, unusual behaviour can consist of running around or a standalone luggage. “At the Melbourne Airport, some behaviour analysis software is used, mainly for detection of unattended baggage or objects,” says Jones.

“Identifying unusual behaviour patterns is certainly one security element that’s proving very effective at the Houston Airport System (HAS), particularly in mitigating ‘minor’ disturbances,” according to Frank Haley, interim deputy director for public safety and technology at HAS.

The HAS served over 51 million passengers in 2006, including over seven million international travellers. Haley recalls an officer correctly identifying a distressed passenger before she became too much of a problem. “It saved a lot of time and hassle for the other passengers,” he says. “There have also been plenty of instances of people needing medical assistance.”

In other cases, video analytics on IP cameras have opened up opportunities for enhancing security. Crowd detection capabilities help identify crowd size and queue length to prevent overcrowding situations which may result in injuries to the public; it also spots people or vehicle loitering near secure or high-value areas.

Elsewhere in Australia, at the Port Macquarie Airport, the latest video analytics system has been used to keep track of events. The system’s in-built artificial intelligence analyses the airport’s video surveillance, instantly alerting airport personnel of any behaviours or activities that appear hazardous or suspicious, whilst ignoring unimportant things. One of the key issues for Port Macquarie Airport was perimeter access and intrusion detection, says Lane Dechaineux, security manager at the airport.

“The new security system is empowering in that it provides airport personnel instant alerting of any suspicious events or behavior such as perimeter breach, slip and fall and loitering in sensitive areas of the airport. The system also counts the number of people moving to and from the terminal, which is useful to us,” says Dechaineux.

At the Clapham Junction Station in Britain, an intelligent CCTV system based on video analytics technology is being used to detect intruders and unusual behaviour. Also, the system can be designed to identify graffiti. The system can immediately detect any change to a train’s appearance. It then highlights the defaced carriage on a screen. This can help staff identify the culprits and keep track of them while the police are alerted.

The Hong Kong immigration office has deployed the world’s first car-passenger face identification system, using NEC’s NeoFace system. The system enables face identification of car passengers by way of a database check when vehicles pass through immigration control points between Hong Kong and mainland China, based on biometric information compiled as part of a national ID card scheme.

Moving forward with digital CCTV?

IP surveillance cameras integrated with video analytics have widened the scope of security and increased the chances of nabbing a criminal. It combines high quality images with the ability to analyse footage, where CCTV is integrate with other systems such as access control, or when the size and complexity of the installation calls for a high volume recording capacity. Analog cameras are ideal for small, single-site premises where deterrence is the primary requirement and staff can be relied upon to practice good tape management.

IP surveillance has been around for several years, but until recently, this technology had not successfully penetrated the mainstream security market, due mainly to initial bandwidth requirements and resistance from IT managers protecting their networks. Newer compression formats have solved most of the bandwidth problems and the industry has come to view IP’s integration potential very favourably.

“Network Video Monitoring is rapidly growing in popularity, and will soon overtake analog as the predominant surveillance technology,” says Hirano Sony

“In two to three years time, many companies will be fulfilling their network security devices from a wider price range and soon it will become easier to prepare the broadband network. This market change will boost the adoption of IP surveillance dramatically,” says Mayumi Sakaguchi, spokesperson for JVC.

Now is the time to capture the cost savings and enhanced capabilities of this new and innovative technology. Only with risks kept to a minimum can an organisation focus on the business at hand.