SmartCatch for a safer ‘silly season'
By Staff Writers
With New Year revelry, comes an increase in anti-social behaviour, and a subsequent need for greater security and police vigilance. Recent statistics on rates of common assault and malicious property damage show that reported incidents spike by up to 350% during New Year celebrations.
As security personnel and law enforcement authorities look for ways to quickly defuse potential conflict and keep celebrations on a high, NEC Business Solutions has announced the Australian launch of SmartCatch: new intelligent video surveillance technology, created by NEC subsidiary, Vidient Systems.
SmartCatch is a significant advance on existing automated video surveillance technologies, with the capability to identify and track a broad range of predetermined risk behaviours, including unauthorised vehicles and persons entering facilities, loiterers, and dropped objects such as packages, luggage and bags. Automated detection of these behaviours can allow faster security responses and reduce the risk of incidents escalating because they have not been identified by guards manually monitoring video feeds.
“Security requirements for public spaces, transport infrastructure and corporate properties are becoming increasingly demanding,” said NEC Business Solutions’ Senior Product Manager for Security and Hosted Solutions, Lance Heather. “In busy public spaces, it’s now essential to deploy comprehensive video surveillance systems in order to monitor and respond to security threats as quickly and effectively as possible.”
“An effective surveillance solution is one which leaves no ‘black spots’,” said Lance. “As the camera network becomes more widespread, it becomes physically very difficult for staff to adequately monitor the whole network, and comprehensively detect unusual or suspicious behaviours.
“As a result, many organisations end up spending enormous amounts storing video data so that if an incident occurs and isn’t picked up, it can be reviewed.”
Unlike traditional systems which can only track movement, SmartCatch analyses individual pixel change in video feeds, allowing it to identify stationery objects that have been placed in restricted areas.
“SmartCatch not only improves the detection method for video surveillance, it automatically alerts staff to incidents in progress and records only those incidents. This keeps staff on the ball and drastically reduces the burden of storing all the footage,” added Lance.
The technology can be applied to existing camera networks, protecting organisations’ significant investment in surveillance equipment. SmartCatch’s Software Development Kit (SDK) also allows integration into existing Access Control Systems and current video management platforms.
Smartcatch is currently undergoing a number of pilots in the Australian market and already organisations in the government, transport and major events infrastructure sectors have expressed interest in the solution.
[Wed 13/12/2006 02:54:28]
|
