VIDEO SURVEILLANCE
A look into the products, technologies and solutions shaping the market
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INNOVATION IN OVERDRIVE
Smarter access control and video as a business intelligence tool are just two of the major trends gaining momentum in recent years
By Neil Sutton
Brian McIlravey stepped back from the security industry in 2018 and returned just a few months ago.
He spent more than 10 years in policing and 16-plus years in leadership roles at incident management company PPM (which became Resolver via an acquisition in 2015) before joining Igloo Software, an intranet and digital workplace company, as vice-president of customer experience. McIlravey returned to security full-time last year as the chief operating officer of RightCrowd, a pro-
vider of security and compliance solutions including access control, visitor management and contact tracing.
How did the security industry change in the three years McIlravey was away? The obvious answer is the pandemic — the one, sweeping factor that has altered the way business is done across almost all industries. But more than that, security is on an evolutionary path that has acceler-
ated in recent times, notes McIlravey.
“I can’t believe the amount of technology that has changed in three years,” he says, citing the growing influence of the cloud on security products and services, as well as the technical sophistication of today’s security robots (McIlravey is also a member of Robotic Assistance Device’s advisory board).
“The old-school ways of security are just starting to disappear,” he says.
“The old-school ways of security are just starting to disappear.”
— Brian McIlravey,
RightCrowd
Confronting access chaos
Back in the saddle of the security business, McIlravey’s attention is now focused on workforce access management and battling perceptions of access as simply an allor-nothing proposition. “I think the whole concept of access control has to change from the card either works or it doesn’t,” he says.
There are many layers of security beyond the access card, he explains, which can dictate when and where that card is able to grant access and what specific doors it will open. McIlravey’s company RightCrowd provides what he calls a workflow layer that can help an end user establish rules, such as which days an employee’s card will grant access and to which specific office location, based on an agreed upon schedule.
This type of technology has taken on a much greater level of importance during the pandemic, notes McIlravey, as employers are compelled to follow strict guidelines around capacity limits, social distancing and the potential for virus exposure.
RightCrowd offers a lanyard-based product that makes these distinctions even clearer — the wearable acts as a sort of holster for an access card, is colourcoded to indicate access permission and will dynamically change colour based on circumstance.
A contact-tracing element is integrated into RightCrowd’s offering — the wearable will flash yellow if one employee gets too close to another, and will flash red if that distance is closer than three feet. A contact-tracing incident is also logged into a report if this occurs.
RightCrowd will also integrate with an attestation form, i.e. an employee’s acknowledgement of current health status, as well as the days or hours they plan to work in the office.
The pandemic may have accelerated this trend of more sophistication in access control, says McIlravey, but it was already well underway. For example, the onus is on an organization to cancel access rights for employees who have quit or been terminated.
“It’s way more common than we think,” says McIlravey. “Think of that risk: if one of those people comes back into the
“It makes good business sense to understand how your visitors, your customers, your guests are navigating spaces.”
— StephanieWeagle,BriefCam
workplace and causes an event or an incident … could you have known or should you have known that person shouldn’t have access? Well, the answer is yes, and it’s a massive liability risk.”
It’s a matter of addressing what McIlravey calls “access chaos.”
“There’s so many people, so many cards, so many access rights, so many layers — people are going to have to start tackling it very, very soon.”
Next level analytics
Stephanie Weagle, chief marketing officer at BriefCam, joined the company four years ago, and in that time has seen a marked transition in how its products are used and by whom.
“When I joined BriefCam, more than 80 per cent of our business was done within law enforcement, within the safety and security use-cases,” says Weagle. Today, security is closer to 50 per cent of the overall business due to steep growth in video analytics for operational and marketing applications.
“It makes good business sense to understand how your visitors, your customers, your guests are navigating spaces, where the bottlenecks are, [and] some of their behaviours moving through spaces,” she says.
“From our perspective, the biggest shift that we’ve seen in the last year or two, and where we see the shift continuing to evolve over time, is really beyond safety and security.”
A decade ago, the video analytics industry might have been accused of overpromising and under-delivering, says Weagle, but those criticisms are “a distant memory today.”
Conversations with clients are also easier since many of the advantages of the technology are self-evident and typically well understood.
“Certainly the advances in deep learning research and certainly the overwhelming amount of cameras and devices that are out there collecting data at any given moment is really transforming the space,” she says.
Video analytics are also being used to drive business intelligence, which means the customer might be the marketing department rather than security.
“We’re seeing that once the operational folks are understanding what video analytics can do for them and their environment, they’re footing the bill,” says Weagle.
“So the safety and security teams are getting the benefit of video analytics as they typically would, but other departments are paying for it. It’s a very interesting dynamic.”
Similar to access control, video analytics have also adapted to changing conditions created by the pandemic.
The technology’s facility for detection has been useful in terms of mask mandates, social distancing and contact tracing, says Weagle, which ultimately helps retailers, transportation hubs and other industries get back to business.
Pandemic hanging on
While COVID has accelerated the development of some technologies (access control and video analytics to enable smoother transitions between working on- or off-site, or periods of lockdown), the security industry is still facing the same headwinds as many other businesses. The supply chain crunch, for example, may be taking a toll.
“The pressure on semiconductor production in particular is both unprecedented and pronounced and that has been much discussed, but costs are also up across the board, for everything from shipping to raw materials to components such
as cases, cables, lenses, and packing materials, so it’s a real issue,” states Owen Kell, senior IoT research associate at Memoori, in a recent market report. “These costs will eventually get passed onto customers if they aren’t starting to be already.”
“The challenges we face in this industry are not all that different than other companies are experiencing,” adds Tim Grose, remarking that equipment with computer chips is subject to shortages. (Grose, who recently joined Kandor Management Corp. as chief revenue officer and was previously vice-president of sales at Allied Universal Technology Services, responded to questions via email.)
On the upside, however, clients are also aware of these supply chain challenges, which may in some cases lead them
to reach decisions more quickly when it comes to security installs.
“Integrators and media are notifying the customers of these issues and forcing them to be more proactive with the procurement of these parts,” says Grose, “… so what might seem like a problem could actually be a nice uplift in sales.”
According to Kell, the prevailing wisdom from supply chain pundits on when these shortages might end is anywhere from six months to the remainder of 2022.
He notes, however, that there is talk of the potential for long-term supply chain resilience due to increased “‘re-shoring’ or increased regionalisation of production capacity,” but there is little evidence at the moment of that change occurring within the security industry.
“Making profound changes to the supply chain of any industry is not an easy process,” says Kell, adding that companies can spend decades cultivating partner and supplier relationships. “So if change does come, we expect it to be more noticeable over a five to 10 year period, rather than in the next 12 months.”
A more immediate concern, says Grose, is the availability of workforce to go on site for security installs.
Installers have generally been able to gain site access throughout the pandemic by working during off-peak hours, but vaccination requirements have complicated the process. “This has caused some issues and shortages of labour when workers refuse to be vaccinated,” says Grose. “This starts a downward spiral that leads to delays for completion, less availability of qualified workers and overall anxiety to realize revenue on projects.”
Pace of change
There are so many factors to consider today that making predictions about the security industry is perhaps a more onerous task than it might have been only a few years ago. But it’s also reasonable to say that the health crisis has amplified and accelerated some trends that were already in motion, whether that’s cloud adoption, smart access control, or video surveillance as a business intelligence tool.
Kell’s report notes that the physical security market is predicted to grow almost 12 per cent year-on-year in 2021 — about twice the rate of the global economy.
“The upgrading to newer IP technology has opened new avenues [for end users] to gain insights into parts of their business that were only available by way of third-party reports,” notes Grose. “This is giving them real time assessments to make decisions.”
As the value proposition changes, so does the expertise required today to successfully sell security solutions. Grose adds that effective integrators may need insight into all aspects of a customer’s business in order to capitalize on this transition. “The team that brings the best knowledge base to the table stands the best chance to win the deal,” he says.
RightCrowd offers a contact tracing tool via its digital badgeholder technology that utilizes Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE). The wearable detects when employees are closer than six feet and indicates the interaction with a colour change on the device.
Hanwha Techwin: A Partner for Success
Security professionals need more than just products that monitor and protect. They also need data-driven insights into every aspect of their operations. Security and surveillance solutions need to include end-to-end intelligent video surveillance options combining image quality, performance and analytics.
As the world changes, so must the latest intelligent video surveillance solutions, keeping pace with customers’ evolving needs.
With every business now a connected business, the threat of cybersecurity attacks grows more real every day. New innovations in technology can also create new opportunities for suspicious or malicious activity – making security a priority for any organization.
It All Begins with Network and Device Security
The best security policies are the ones that begin at the factory, with unique device certification issuing system embedding certificates and encryption keys built into each chip. These “groundup” security policies ensure end-to-end product cybersecurity at each step of the surveillance process, guaranteeing all video is securely stored, encrypted and accessible only by authorized users.
Two of the biggest network threats are botnets, which take over or flood your network and cause denial of service, and ransomware, malicious software designed to block access to a computer system. The many different devices or nodes connected throughout
a network could be highly susceptible to either of these threats unless proper precautions are taken.
Always Looking Ahead
It’s critical that every corner of our industry is continually integrating new and emerging innovations with established products, ensuring customers’ surveillance devices and solutions are as future-proof as possible. This approach must be combined with tracking the latest security trends to provide customers with the best consulting expertise on what they can do to protect their data and their operations.
Artificial Intelligence
Many businesses are increasingly realizing the benefits of Artificial Intelligence (AI). Beyond protecting and monitoring, surveillance and security solutions are incorporating on-board analytics delivering data that can drive intelligent business decisions. The role of data and analytics will continue to expand significantly in 2022 and beyond, as customers combine edge computing and AI to complement and enhance data collection and analytics.
The use of Edge AI, especially with analytics based on deep learning algorithms, can be a key element in a range of “smart network” surveillance applications. These include delivering more accurate object detection and classification, while reducing latency and system bandwidth burdens and enhancing realtime data gathering.
AI and edge computing will continue to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of network video surveillance systems, applying analytics (object, loitering, virtual line and area crossing detection to name a few) to monitor every type of area or situation.
Cloud-based Video Surveillance
The trend of cloud adoption will continue. The pandemic certainly removed many of the roadblocks to adoption and accelerated its spread. Companies needed new solutions fast and they needed to work. That’s one of the biggest benefits to the cloud: you can have a cloud video system up and running super quick. As more dealers and integrators become familiar and fluent with cloud video platforms, they’ll recommend and offer it to more of their customers, which will greatly help in keeping adoption rates on the rise.
Zero Trust
To protect against the risk of sensitive data leakage or potential breaches to financial systems, an organization’s IT department may require a Zero Trust Access approach, providing users with the minimum required privileges to perform their jobs. It basically means every identity and activity taking place across a network is verified.
These are only a sample of the security and surveillance trends organizations need to be aware of as they continue to navigate the post-pandemic world and strive for long-term success.
Proven technology.
Hanwha Techwin meets the constantly changing needs of security professionals and delivers intelligent video surveillance solutions. Our surveillance technologies address every requirement for any professional application, combining image quality, performance and analytics. And we’re always evolving - continually updating and expanding our solutions to stay ahead of changing industry trends.
Hanwha Techwin: Your Partner for Success Now and In the Future
How GardaWorld’s cost-effective Mobile Surveillance Units prevented theft at a construction site
The Context
SGC Construction (SGC), a Canadian construction company, needed to take action to secure their construction site and prevent thefts. While hiring physical security guards to be present day and night might have been an effective strategy, it was simply not a viable option in this case due to cost. Instead, the client needed an innovative and cost-effective solution to secure the area and ultimately prevent theft of valuable equipment. SGC’s Mr. Daniel Bergeron approached GardaWorld Security Systems with their problem, and our Mobile Surveillance Units (MSUs) immediately came to mind as a potential solution. We have outfitted several construction sites with MSUs and successfully helped companies with requests like this one. However, the unique nature and layout of this site in downtown Montreal warranted a new, innovative solution customized to fit SGC’s needs.
The Solution
Committed to finding an effective solution for SGC, our Security Systems team in Quebec applied their expertise to create, install and test three new MSU Minis—making sure they function as effectively as our traditional MSUs. Even though they were smaller, the devices were still fitted with analytical cameras and were connected to the GardaWorld Monitoring central station, when triggered. Just like our traditional surveil-
lance units, this new smaller device can monitor around the clock or at specific times. If unusual motion is detected, an alarm is triggered. Thanks to innovative software that interprets and analyzes the images captured by the cameras, the unit is designed to avoid false alarms. If a suspicious event is detected, the signal is sent directly to our GardaWorld Monitoring central station for observation and action. This increases visibility and allows for an immediate, real-time response to take place, which is often not possible with most typical CCTV technology. The surveillance system includes fixed and adjustable cameras that are resistant to harsh environments and provide a detailed 360-degree view. A connected app offers visual remote access in real time. The app also allows clients to view action sequences taken before an alarm, and email or text alerts help to prevent or reduce the cost of potential damage or theft. The MSU Mini can be installed in just a few hours, providing a rapid solution to customers who need help preventing theft, verifying H&S claims and accessing remote work areas—perfect for SGC’s needs. Unlike our traditional MSU, this new smaller device also opens additional avenues for video surveillance and associated real-time monitoring in and around other smaller areas, such as certain construction sites, warehouses, garages, and building stairwells.
The Result
Shortly after the new MSU Minis were installed at SGC’s site, a break-in did in fact take place. However, thanks to GardaWorld, the attempted theft was successfully captured on camera and allowed for our GardaWorld Monitoring representatives to respond immediately. Within minutes, local law enforcement was dispatched and quickly arrived on site. The perpetrators were apprehended shortly thereafter, and the stolen property was recovered. With GardaWorld’s innovative and effective solution in place, the theft was prevented—saving SGC money and ensuring peace of mind going forward.
GardaWorld’s client, Mr. Daniel Bergeron, ordered additional MSU Minis following the prevented theft to strengthen the onsite security program further. He had the following to say about the partnership: “The GardaWorld Security Systems team has exceeded my expectations with their innovative technology solution, MSU Minis, which allows us to keep an eye on our construction site operations. The cameras and alert system built into the MSU Minis made it possible to quickly apprehend a theft. I would also like to thank GardaWorld Monitoring for their 24/7 support. I am confident that this partnership will continue to grow throughout the project.”
For more information, contact us today: 1-833-427 3233
A Spectrum of New Possibilities with ColorVu + X
ColorVu with (“+”) Hikvision’s advanced technology (“X”), such as panoramic viewing functionality, delivers 24/7 vivid colour surveillance, even in complete darkness
Hikvision’s advanced technologies ColorVu + X cameras render clear imaging with vivid details for video evidence, improved alarm accuracy for real security threats, and video search efficiency, taking your security above and beyond what was previously possible.
Darkness has been a blind spot for surveillance equipment in the past, but Hikvision’s ColorVu technology captures vivid, full panoramic details in dark corners, shadows and low-light situations.
Panoramic Cameras – a Highlight of ColorVu + X
Panoramic cameras are now available with ColorVu to harness pioneering pixel-level image registration technology to stitch together a 180-degree viewing capability. Wide-area security footage helps improve situational awareness and reduces the amount of cameras required for comprehensive monitoring, aiding cost efficiency.
What is ColorVu + X?
The + X is a series of innovative technologies that elevate and complement ColorVu’s already vivid colour imaging capabilities.
ColorVu + Panoramic
Expanding the boundaries of brilliance with a full 180-degree horizontal view, a true market pioneer to deliver brilliant and seamless panoramas with more lively details.
ColorVu + Varifocal
Changeable focal lengths for more flexibility
ColorVu + 4K
Capture richer, more colourful details with fluid preview and playback
ColorVu + Live Guard
Day and night protection, providing visual and auditory warnings on-site and in real-tim
ColorVu + Deep Learning
Smarter detection around the clock, taking alarm accuracy and search efficiency to a whole new level
Cutting-Edge Technology and Sensors
What gives ColorVu cameras such brilliant imagery? Every camera features a F1.0, super-aperture and a 4MP 1/1.8” advanced sensor that is further enhanced with Backside Illumination (BSI), Dual Conversion Gain (DCG) and Wide Dynamic Range (WDR) technologies to ensure bright and colourful imaging in virtually all conditions.
ColorVu also features Active Alignment Technology which adds an additional layer of quality control during the production process and guarantees focusing performance, ensuring superior reliability for every camera in the field.
Harnessing the Power of AI
In addition, AcuSense utilizes Motion Detection 2.0, meaning minimal false alarms triggered by weather and light changes. End users will appreciate reduced time and disruption searching video clips for specific events. AcuSense also produces quick, smart and reliable alarms for users to filter targets, improving alarms that better indicate and classify moving targets.
ColorVu + X technology elevates Hikvision cameras, not only delivering vivid colour video 24/7 but also adding a series of technologies that guarantee better and wider imaging, more details, smarter surveillance control, and deliver unmatched value to the security market.
