Sen dec2016

december 2016 Issue 383

Affordable Access Control

PP 100001158

l Scentre Group CCTV Shootout l Physical Security: Why IT Matters l Best Products of 2016 l Vivotek Releases H.265 Range l Securing IP CCTV Cameras

l Monitoring: Z-Wave Goes IoT l Genetec Plans Growing Future l Vin Lopes Talks Integration l Addictive Technology’s SaaS l Security & Government Expo

Š 2016 Genetec Inc. Genetec, the Genetec logo and the Mobius strip logo are trademarks of Genetec Inc., and may be registered or pending registration in several jurisdictions.

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Pixels need perspective

The details definitely matter, but security shouldn’t be short sighted. At Genetec we realize that systems that work are systems that work together. Our software is the only one to bring together video surveillance, access control, license-plate recognition and enterprise security applications via a unified, cloud-enabled platform. Whether you’re a security specialist, a police chief or a CEO, successful solutions see the whole picture, today and tomorrow.

To learn more, visit genetec.com/fits

To see how Genetec and Hills can help with your requirements, call 1300 HILLS1 or visit hills.com.au/branches to find your nearest branch.

editorial s ec u ri ty e l e ct ro n i c s & netwo r ks d e c e mb e r 201 6 issue 383

By John Adams

The Year That Was

OOKING back on 2016 it’s hard not to see groundswells across the electronic security industry that don’t just point to future trends but that underscore the true nature of our technology. The impact of Mirai malware, which turns CCTV recorders and cameras into attack bots, rolls on. Mirai shows us many things – that the electronic security industry is a networked animal and that online ecosystems are unsafe. For the longest time, integrators and end users have managed to avoid being targeted by high profile attacks – mostly through the judicious use of subnets and VLANs – but network defence is going to be a serious consideration in our future.

The expectation of intrinsic security and integrity within network devices puts extra onus on manufacturers who will need to build protective mechanisms and transparency into products and business models – this is something we are going to see more of.

And given moves to include security capabilities as part of alarm and home automation devices from groups like the Z-Wave Alliance, this is not just about CCTV. Everything that touches a network needs to be trusted, needs defending.

There was more integration than ever in 2016 – all the systems we saw were multi-faceted in many ways, not only major systems but smaller solutions, too.

Everybody wants their system to be able to achieve a little bit more and this appetite for control seems to be

L

Video surveillance and access control have long been pitched for their capacity to reduce staffing requirements but we seem to be on the cusp of a bigger change. driven by remote accessibility. When you can turn the security system on and off and view cameras remotely, it suddenly makes sense to be able to answer the intercom and turn on the lights. Control and functionality have entered a mutually supporting feedback loop.

In 2016 end users are driven by security, safety and by economy – not only in private organisations but in Smart Cities’ initiatives. This means solutions capable of handling multiple tasks locally and remotely are in favour, particularly if they reduce staffing levels and especially after hours. Video surveillance and access control have long been pitched for their capacity to reduce staffing requirements but we seem to be on the cusp of a bigger change. Systems of the future will be sold on lateral ROI. The shift is driven by developments in networking, in management software, in alliances between hardware and software makers and in IVA. Here, developments are leading to solutions that make the most of what IVA can reliably do. For decades IVA strove towards the Holy Grail of face recognition 99.9 per cent of the time. Such functionality is possible in perfect conditions but on the street where cameras are installed with other tasks in mind, face recognition is much, much harder and software has proven less capable that human superrecognisers.

What intelligent video analytics does best is tell operators or management systems about incidents that breach application-specific rules – these might involve movements in the wrong

direction, fast movements, gun shots, gathering crowds, fires, the arrival of a numberplate in a carpark, a cluster of flashing lights – whatever pixels can measure or microphones discern.

IVA offers lateral capabilities, too. A large system of surveillance cameras installed around a site gathers vast amounts of useful data that can be leveraged by an enterprise to polish its operations. In a retail mall, that might include the ability to hone marketing strategies, to establish the busiest locations, to uncover bottlenecks to customer movement, to assess the value of opening hours and plenty more.

Alongside and throughout all this is a hunger for situational awareness site-wide, enterprise-wide and citywide. There’s no doubt that the threat profile of recent years drives this to a considerable extent. Everybody accepts that these risks are real, are when not if. Situations involving active shooters or bomb attacks in public spaces, including city centres and public buildings, ramp up the need for emergency and response teams to have holistic understanding of unfolding threats and to be able to share that information in real time.

In 2016 users really started to own the functionality potential of the technologies they are buying and that’s the key trend we see pushing through into next year. The underlying electronic security technology will continue to evolve but the way end users access and action the information of our inputs and outputs – that’s going to be turned onto its head in 2017 and the years to come. n

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42: Vivotek Streams H.265

dec 16 22: Camera Shootout Last month Scentre Group’s National CCTV Camera Shootout was held at Westfield in Bondi Junction. This is the largest CCTV camera shootout of its type in Australia, with the diverse mall environment giving attendees plenty to think about across 4 camera groups.

36: Security & Government Expo Security and Government Expo took place in Canberra last week, with a good crowd taking a look at the latest security solutions and hearing DFAT’s Luke Williams speak. SAGE major industry sponsor ASIS ACT held a concurrent dinner, which was well attended.

38: Open Plan Genetec is leaning into the Australian market, enhancing its relationship with local distributor Hills and expanding the team on the ground as its local business and its product portfolio continue to grow. John Adams spoke with Genetec’s Charles Cousins, MD Asia Pacific Japan, new country manager Philippe Ouimette and Hills’ David Lenz about plans for growth.

Vivotek’s Smart Stream II is a new generation compression technology which allocates more bandwidth to streaming moving objects or regions of interest, resulting in optimized resource usage.

To leverage Smart Stream II, Vivotek has released new cameras, NVRs and software.

44: Affordable Access Control In years past, the notion of affordable access control usually meant significant functional compromise.

No longer. It’s now possible to source highly capable access control solutions that offer integrators and end users affordability, functionality and flexibility.

52: Securing IP Cameras After the recent DDoS botnet attack, integrators and end users need to be thinking seriously about securing IP cameras and the networks they run on.

Fortunately there are many practical measures that can be taken to harden network devices.

58: Physical Security - Why IT matters The security industry is generally quite mature with regards to risk management and mitigation, yet there is a perception that IT security and physical security are unrelated domains, with attitudes often being either that anything being connected is bad or that IT Security is an IT problem.

62: Integrated Solutions The catchcry of the moment is devilishly hard to pin down but while a clear definition of integrated solutions may be opaque, there’s no question

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whatever that for end users centralisation of operational functionality has a powerful resonance. John Adams spoke with Inner Range’s Vin Lopes to discover more.

10 news Latest business, product and technical news from Australia and around the world.

64: Addictive SaaS

56: Monitoring

Harnessing the functionality of MOBOTIX cameras, Addictive Technology Solutions has developed what it describes as a groundbreaking cloud-based retail business intelligence solution.

The Z-Wave Alliance, an open consortium of leading global companies deploying the Z-Wave smart home standard, announced the addition of a security requirement to its longstanding interoperability certification.

66: Best Products of 2016

70: editor’s choice

What were the best and most innovative products of 2016? And where do they suggest the electronic security industry is heading over the next 12 months? Are we pushing ahead when it comes to technology or are market forces giving users and installers easier access to the functionalities of lower quality hardware?

DECEMBER 2016 ISSUE 383

AFFORDABLE ACCESS CONTROL

PP 100001158

l Scentre Group CCTV Shootout l Physical Security: Why IT Matters l Best Products of 2016 l Vivotek Releases H.265 Range l Securing IP CCTV Cameras

l Monitoring: Z-Wave Goes IoT l Genetec Plans Growing Future l Vin Lopes Talks Integration l Addictive Technology’s SaaS l Security & Government Expo

Publisher Bridge Publishing Aust. Pty Ltd ABN 11 083 704 858 PO Box 237 Darlinghurst NSW 1300 tel 61 2 9280 4425 fax 61 2 9280 4428 email info@bridge publishing.com.au

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72: helpdesk Our team of electronic security experts answers your tough technical questions.

Editor John Adams Advertising Manager Monique Keatinge Contributors Simon Pollak Customer Service Annette Mathews tel 61 2 9280 4425 annette@bridge publishing.com.au

Design Tania Simanowsky e: taniasdesign@ optusnet.com.au

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Alloys and Sony Strengthen Partnership with Security Solutions p.12 Alarm.com Grows 25 Per Cent in 12 Months p.13 Bosch and Sony Sign Partnership Agreement p.14 University of Melbourne Electronic Security Upgrade p.16 France Unveils Plans For Unified Biometric Database of Adult Citizens p.18

news in brief december 2016

compiled by john adams

Connect Security to Distribute Bosch Security Video Range

■

CONNECT Security is now distributing Bosch video surveillance products to the NZ market.

The Bosch Video Systems suite of products complements Connect Security’s existing offering of the Bosch intrusion portfolio, including the ever-popular Solution

Series alarm panels, and the newly released G Series, allowing the company to provide a complete Bosch Security solution to its customer base.

Connect Security Products has national coverage and distribution centres in Auckland, Wellington, and Christchurch and

is well-resourced to provide expert support for the complete Bosch Security product range.

“We are pleased to bring the Bosch family of security products under the one banner again in New Zealand,” said Jason Mackie – chief executive officer – Connect Security Products.

“We are confident that with our nationwide branch and technical support network we will continue to offer our customers the necessary service and support, extending the gains we have made with the Bosch intrusion product range into the Bosch CCTV product portfolio.”

Chris Dellenty, general manager Bosch Security Systems said the relationship with Connect Security Products continued to strengthen and prosper.

“The distribution of the Bosch Video Systems portfolio completes the picture for Connect Security’s customers, with products now available in even more locations across New Zealand,” Dellenty said.

EDS Australia Distributing Full HID Range of Readers and Control Panels n ELECTRONIC Development Sales (Australia) is now a platinum distributor for the entire HID range, including iClass SE, Indala, HID Prox, SEOS, EdgeEVO and VertX Panels.

“Many integrators may not know that EDSA distributes not just Indala

Anthony Loh

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but all of HID’s range, iClass SE, HID Prox, Seos, also the EdgeEVO and VertX panels, and we are talking with potential partners on software development to allow us to deliver a complete access control solution,” said Anthony Loh, general manager at Electronic Development Sales (Australia).

“HID’s VertX control panel is widely used in Asia and the pricing is very competitive for systems up to 30-doors, while the EdgeEVO is a 2-door controller that is also very competitive. Being IP-based, HID controllers are very flexible and highly customisable.

“We are a platinum partner

of HID and one of the largest distributors of iClass SE and that’s because we listen to our customers and can tailor a reader/card solution for their specific needs – it’s not just a reader and a card, you can do a lot of different things with encryption keys and programming multiple credentials on the one card,” Loh said.

“People don’t realise it’s not just taking a reader out of a box and installing it. We’ve done many sites that have incorporated considerable customisation to handle specific requirements of an installation, which requires the right configuration.”

According to Loh, HID’s

SEOS solutions, which employ smart mobile devices as access control credentials via Bluetooth are another strength of the HID range, allowing end users to decrease the time it takes to issue or revoke a credential and to eliminate the cost of managing huge libraries of credentials in sites like universities.

Other products EDSA distributes include MorphoAccess fingerprint/ vein, Schlage hand geometry and Iris ID iris biometric readers.

Clients include highly respected integrators Fredon, Honeywell, Johnson Controls, Chubb, Siemens, Eaton and Stanley.

Gallagher Wins Twice at NZ International Business Awards 2016

Sir William Gallagher

GALLAGHER, one of New Zealand’s longest-running pioneering business success stories, took away 2 accolades at the New Zealand International Business Awards 2016 late November, named Best Large Business and topping the Excellence in Design category.

The Gallagher story started when the late Bill Gallagher (senior) invented the electric fence, and started the company on a Waikato farm in 1938. Since then, Gallagher has grown to become a world leader in electric fence systems, and used that success to expand into related areas including security and fuel systems.

The $NZD200 million-plus company has 1100 staff, exports to 130 countries, has 3 manufacturing sites in New Zealand. Its world headquarters remain at Hamilton in Waikato.

Sir William Gallagher (junior) started working for his father’s company on the shop floor more than 50 years ago, and says it’s Kiwi ingenuity that sets them apart from competitors overseas.

“Our whole business growth is based on being relentless in the pursuit of solving challenges for our customers. It’s how we consistently drive out of the box,” he says.

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news december 2016

City of Melbourne Seeks Support for Electronic Security Systems n The Victorian Government is seeking an integration company to handle multiple aspects of maintenance, repairs, support and replacement to all City of Melbourne properties that incorporate electronic security solutions.

The scope of the services will include, but not be limited to: • Preventative maintenance on all electronic security systems and allied equipment • Provision of a full-time maintenance technician (and consideration for an

apprentice) during normal business hours to attend to maintenance and repair activities • Repairs to faults, including out-of-hours faults, on all electronic security systems and allied equipment • Provision of regular and ad-hoc reports, together with updates to asset registers, asset databases and drawings, and the continued updating and maintenance of a document library relating to all City of Melbourne properties that have any form of security system covered by this

contract • Provision of assistance and services associated with special projects and unique requests • Minor works and upgrades to existing security systems • Design and installation of new electronic security systems including supply of equipment and project management • System administration of the security systems including programming as required.

Expressions of interest close on December 16, 2016.

Fredon Upgrades Canberra Hospital C-Cure Access Control Solution n FREDON Security’s ACT team has executed a major C-Cure upgrade at the Canberra Hospital. The project was prompted by the existing installation approaching capacity, which highlighted the requirement to strengthen the resilience of the growing platform.

Canberra Hospital was a mission-critical environment where an outage would have been unacceptable. The work was completed quickly and seamlessly over a 10-day period, despite several technical issues, without interruption or inconvenience to the patients or staff.

Planning for the new work leveraged top-grade

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infrastructure in ACT Health, which supports a large access control and video surveillance platform across most ACT Health sites. Specially sourced high speed network interface cards provide a constant 10 Gigabit multipath connection between the sites to enable a fault tolerant distributed system using a master and slave server architecture.

Thanks to this infrastructure, each site can operate autonomously and in the event of a communications failure there is no disruption to electronic security services.

These complex additional layers provide protection against a multiple system

failure The project received recognition from Tyco at a regional level.

“A Performance Excellence Award from Tyco Security Product recognises the technical, planning and delivery expertise that Fredon Security demonstrated in undertaking this sophisticated upgrade for ACT Health, said Mark Romer – regional sales director Pacific for Tyco Security Products.

“Both teams worked collaboratively leveraging each other’s expertise delivering an excellent result. I can’t think of a more deserving project for recognition and I

congratulate the team at Fredon Security.”

Fredon’s installation at Canberra Hospital also won an ASIAL Excellence Award recently.

“This award is fantastic recognition – not just for the team in the ACT but for the electronic security business as a whole,” said Danny Berkovic, managing director, Fredon Security.

“I’m really proud of the culture of excellence that is continuing to grow in the business and has been recognised year-on-year by an independent judging panel. Congratulations and well done to the entire team, and thank you to our clients for their ongoing support,” he said.

Alloys and Sony Strengthen Partnership with Security Solutions SONY and Alloys report they have joined forces in video security solutions to further align and strengthen their ongoing partnership. Both parties have traditionally been strong in projection and display panels but with this announcement a new exciting chapter is underway in surveillance solutions.

“The partnership is a natural extension as Alloys fits perfectly with the company’s distribution strategy,” said Steve Charles, sales and marketing manager ANZ for Sony Security Solutions.

“Alloys is committed to source products that provide the best market solutions.”

According to Charles, Sony is looking to increase channel partners outside of its traditional markets and sees Alloys nontraditional approach as the perfect fit moving forward.

“With Alloys as our distributor, we increase our presence into the IT and project space. We believe Alloys experience and values will allow customers to receive the best support and access to Sony products,” Charles said.

Alloys CEO Paul Harman said the company was delighted with the new partnership.

“Sony possess a wide ranging product offering which strengthens Alloys position in surveillance distribution,” Harman said.

Steve Charles

Perth Integrator DTI Wins $A800,000 CCTV Contract with ECG Rail n DTI Group has won yet another rail job in the UK, signing an $A800,000 contract with Deutsche Bahn’s UK rolling stock consultancy, ESG Ltd (ESG Rail), for the supply of 66 high definition CCTV surveillance systems for trains operated by London Midland.

Under the contract, DTI will supply forward-facing and saloon video surveillance systems, as well as remote viewing and data download infrastructure at strategic depots and control rooms across the UK network.

ESG will be responsible for the turnkey delivery of the project.

The systems deployed will include high definition megapixel cameras, connected to DTI’s feature

rich MDR-6 recording unit, communicating via 3G/4G/Wi-Fi. DTI’s comprehensive back office software will provide ‘live’ and historical video review, fleet diagnostics, mass storage and alarm event management capability to multiple beneficiary parties.

In addition, DTI’s Pantograph monitoring system will provide one train with the capability to analyse overhead lines, alerting London Midland and Network Rail to anomalies identified. Pantographs are the devices mounted on the roof of an electric train to transfer power to the train through contact with the overhead line electrification. Pantographs with overhead power are now the dominant form of

power collection for modern electric trains.

DTI’s Pantograph video analytics solution automatically tags potential faults along the catenary structure which provides power to trains while in motion. This analysis results in cost savings for train operators and infrastructure maintainers alike by notifying them of potential faults early - before they escalate.

DTI’s contract with ESG Rail has an initial value of £0.5 million (A$ 0.8 million) and the project is expected to be completed during the 2016–17 financial year. This award follows a number of other recent project wins in the UK, including London Underground and Virgin Trains.

John Gellel

John Gellel joins Kastle Systems as General Manager n AS general manager, John Gellel will be responsible for Kastle Systems’ operations and growth across Australia and New Zealand.

Prior to joining Kastle Systems, Gellel spent 15 years with Honeywell Ltd across multiple business units, Ademco, ADI, Honeywell Security Group (HSG) and Honeywell Security & Fire; mostly as general manager, HSG/ADI. “Kastle Systems operates a unique business model, backed by great technology and solution offerings,” Gellel said.

“Strong customer service and back up support is ingrained in Kastle’s DNA, which attracted me to join Kastle Systems.”

Kastle Systems has a

40-year history in the electronic security industry and was named the 2015 Systems Integrator of the Year for outstanding innovation and customer experience by SDM. Kastle operates and manages security systems for its clients remotely, around-the clock. Kastle protects over 10,000 locations nationwide and internationally.

Headquartered in Falls Church, Virginia, Kastle is the largest security company in DC according to the Washington Business Journal. Kastle Systems also has offices in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Houston, Dallas, Chicago, New York, Philadelphia and Sydney, Australia.

to Alarm.com for our marketleading technology which begins with interactive home security but also includes video, automation and energy management,”

Trundle said. “And our team continues to work hard to deliver innovation and new capabilities that are ahead of the curve in these emerging areas.”

Alarm.com Grows 25 Per Cent in 12 Months n Alarm.com Holdings issued third-quarter earnings results after the market closed on Monday.

Revenue grew by more than 25 per cent compared with the same period in 2015, driven by both software and hardware sales. Higher operating costs hurt GAAP profitability, but adjusted earnings grew faster than revenue.

The company reported 19 cent earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating

the consensus estimate of 11 cents by 8 cents. The company earned $US67.8 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $59.73 million.

SaaS and license revenue for the third quarter was $44.6 million, an increase of 23% year-over-year. Total revenue amounted to $67.8 million for the quarter, a 26% increase year-overyear. Net income was $2.6 million and non-GAAP

adjusted net income was $9.1 million for the third quarter. Adjusted EBITDA for the third quarter was $11.7 million.

Alarm.com President & CEO Steve Trundle said security remains the primary buying criteria for consumers interested in smart home capabilities. Many consumers, he said, prefer to hire security professionals to design, install, service and monitor their systems.

“Our service providers look

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news december 2016

Bosch and Sony Sign Partnership Agreement

Win a Trip to ISC West with Hills and Pelco n HILLS and Pelco are offering 2 customers the chance to fly to Las Vegas to attend the International Security Conference and Exposition – also known as ISC West – in April 2017.

ISC West is the largest physical security tradeshow in the North America, showcasing the latest in security products and technology. It features all segments of the security market, including access control, alarms and monitoring, biometrics, IP security, video surveillance/ CCTV, and networked security products.

Competition winners will also have the opportunity to visit Pelco’s global

headquarters in California and meet key Pelco staff and executives, as well as experiencing the latest Pelco products. The visit includes a guided tour of the Pelco stand and a ticket to the Pelco Party in Las Vegas, which is renowned as the biggest event on the social calendar during ISC West.

Ian McKinnon, Hills vendor manager IP CCTV, said that the promotion highlighted a re-invigorated Pelco strategy, with significant investment into IP technology to develop leading edge, open platform products.

“Pelco has a rich history in CCTV and security innovation, and Hills is

City of Melbourne and City of Port Philip Seek Integrated Security Services n CITY of Melbourne and City of Port Phillip have sought tenders for the provision of integrated security services.

Further details of the tender have not been forthcoming but may include installation and maintenance of intrusion detection, access control and video surveillance

solutions across City of Melbourne and City of Port Phillip, or federalisation of existing solutions.

Tenderers may lodge a submission for: • City of Melbourne and City of Port Phillip (joint) • City of Melbourne only • City of Port Phillip only.

The tender closed late November

proud to represent their product in the ANZ market,” McKinnon said. “The invitation to their global HQ is a unique opportunity, especially at a time when they are bringing new, next generation technologies to market.”

“Innovation is key in the highly competitive landscape of the video surveillance, and the latest in surveillance technology, from around the world, will be showcased at ISC West – making this prize an invaluable insight into the future of the security market.”

To enter purchase any Pelco

by Schneider Electric, Sarix, Spectra Enhanced or Optera

products from Hills and you could be attending ISC West, as well as experiencing the sights and sounds of Las Vegas. For more information, and full terms and conditions, visit hills.com. au/pelco-promo or contact your nearest Hills branch on 1300 445 571.

The invitation to their global HQ is a unique opportunity, especially at a time when they are bringing new, next generation technologies to market.

Bosch Security Systems and Sony Corporation have signed a contract to establish a business partnership from January 1, 2017.

Under the terms of the agreement, Sony video security customers in all markets but Japan will be served and supported by the sales and marketing teams at Bosch Security Systems.

“This partnership will revolutionize the video security industry since it combines the unique technological expertise and strengths of 2 leading companies in the field of video security applications,” says Toru Katsumoto, deputy president of imaging products and solutions, sector president of professional products group, Sony Corp.

“Customers can prosper from Sony’s superior image quality, like its 4K solutions, combined with Bosch’s bitrate management and video analytics. This unique partnership also supports Bosch’s vision concerning the Internet of Things.

“Video security cameras and more specifically the data they are collecting play an important role in the further development of the Internet of Things.

The video cameras might be called as ‘the eyes of the Internet of Things’,” said Gert van Iperen, president of Bosch Security Systems.

Sony’s video security customers will be served and supported by a sales and marketing team within Bosch that will offer customer support, after-sales service and training in different languages in over 50 countries worldwide.

Gert van Iperen

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Open the door to a new future.

T RU ST E D T EC H N O LO GY

news december 2016

University of Melbourne Electronic Security Upgrade n IPP Consulting has gone to tender for an electronic security infrastructure upgrade at the University of Melbourne’s Parkville Campus and all other campuses. According to the request for tender, Melbourne University intends to engage a provider to deliver the upgrade over a period of approximately one year. The University intends to invite organisations which are successful in responding to this RFEOI to participate in a Tender process to select a supplier for the provision of the goods and services.

This upgrade is expected to include: * Replacement of security management software; * Replacement of alarm and access control panels; * Integration or replacement of existing access cards and

16 se&n

readers; and • Implementation of high level interfaces to support integrated operational platform.

This Request for Expressions of Interest (RFEOI) seeks to enable the University to identify potential suppliers who are: • Capable of delivering a project of this type and scale; and • Able to provide solutions that are fit for the described purpose.

The University of Melbourne, founded in 1853, it is Australia’s second oldest university and the oldest in Victoria. The main campus is located in Parkville, an inner suburb north of the Melbourne central business district.

There are 12 colleges located on the main campus and in nearby suburbs

offering academic, sporting and cultural programs alongside accommodation for Melbourne students and faculty.

The university has 4 other campuses in metropolitan

Melbourne at Burnley, Southbank, Hawthorn and Werribee.

In regional Victoria, the Creswick and Dookie campuses are used for forestry and agriculture

courses respectively. The Shepparton campus is home to the Rural Health Academic Centre for the Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences.

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news december 2016

France Unveils Plans For Unified Biometric Database of Adult Citizens

Matt Brabender (left), James Todd and Peter Grimshaw

New Major Projects BDM for CSD Victoria n CSD says its fast growth rate has demanded the addition of further strength to the Victorian team with the appointment of James Todd, formerly of Hills Ltd, as major projects BDM. “It has taken quite some n FRENCH authorities have unveiled plans for a unified biometric database of the nation’s 60 million citizens over the age of 12. The move was pushed through on a national holiday without debate by the National Assembly and the database would be available for terrorism investigations.

The new database will hold an individual’s name, date and place of birth, gender, eye colour, height, address, photograph, fingerprints, e-mail address, and the names, nationalities, dates and places of birth of parents, according to a report in L’Express. The idea is to make it easier to obtain and renew identity documents, and to aid in the

fight against identity fraud.

The French government argues the new database will only be used to authenticate individuals, not to identify them.

But France’s intelligence services and police will be able to use the database to identify suspects provided “violations of the fundamental interests of the Nation and acts of terrorism” are involved.

An editorial stated that once the database exists, it is highly likely that there will be calls to use it for identification purposes “because it is there,” for example in the wake of a major terrorist attack on French soil.

Questions have also been raised over whether the

government’s use of a decree rather than a law to bring about the creation of the new database was appropriate for a sensitive measure that will affect nearly every French citizen. Only children under 12 will be exempt from a requirement to provide the necessary biometrics.

The other concern with the new unified database is the risk that it will be compromised, which would potentially put the biometric data of 60 million people at risk. Unlike passwords, biometrics cannot be changed, which would make the loss of them a serious long-term problem.

time to find someone capable of fulfilling this role, and we are sure James will be more than what we hoped for,” said CSD general manager sales and distribution, Peter Grimshaw.

Rod Acland Joins Ezi Security as BDM n ACCORDING to Ezi Automation, new BDM Rod Acland brings a passion for technological security applications and vast experience within Australia and internationally to Ezi, which has had spectacular success across Australia in recent years with its extreme risk mitigation products for perimeter protection.

“Acland’s engagement with government and industry specialists contributing to R&D for attack, ballistic and blast resistant solutions in the modern era, is

anticipated to complement Ezi’s high accomplishments developing and providing sophisticated vehicular and personnel controls, permitting unobstructed access for authorised personnel, while stopping violent vehicular attacks dead in their tracks,” Ezi said.

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Sunshine Coast Regional Council Seeks Access Control & Automation Solution n SUNSHINE Coast Regional Council is installing an automated circulation and security system solution for Sunshine Coast Libraries.

Council’s library service includes 8 branches and 2 mobile libraries. The solution will be deployed to all service points as part of a single project rollout.

The project, with a strong

18 se&n

staff productivity focus, is being undertaken to make the borrower-facilitated circulation of library materials quick, simple and effective. The project will involve the following: Stage 1: • Supply of smart labels/tags.

Stage 2: • Implementation/

configuration of software; • Integration with Council’s Library Management System; • Supply and installation of hardware and security; • Support and Maintenance; • System User Acceptance Testing; and • Update of business processes and staff training.

news december 2016

Integrated Control Technology Opens New Office in Europe n INTEGRATED Control Technology has announced the opening of new premises in Amersham, UK. According to ICT, this move is just one step of a strategic plan to develop ICT into a premier global supplier of access control solutions and to meet increased demand for the industryleading ProtegeGX and WX platforms across the EMEA region.

20 se&n

Headed by Ian Henderson and Nicholas Gouloussis, who bring many years’ experience in the security industry to ICT, the new office will provide system design, applications engineering, the full range of ICT products, as well as product training and technical support to serve the EMEA region.

“We are excited to be opening a new office in

the UK that is dedicated to servicing the EMEA Region,” said ICT CEO Hayden Burr.

“Ian and Nicholas have an extensive background in the security and access control industry, which ensures our new and existing partners will experience the high level of sales and support that ICT has become renowned for.”

NZ-based ICT manufactures unified and intelligent electronic access control and security solutions that enable organizations to protect their people, operations and information.

“Our primary vision of providing innovative and superior electronic access control and security solutions that are easy to use and to integrate with existing systems to leverage investments already made, and that are manufactured to the highest of standards.

Tony Lagan Joins Dahua Technology as BDM n Tony Lagan has joined Dahua Technology in the position of BDM. According to Dahua’s Damien White, Lagan has a wealth of experience in CCTV and security in general, and will perfectly complement the Dahua team going forward.

“Tony has the experience, the industry contacts and the enthusiasm to help Dahua become a leader in the Australian CCTV market,” White said.

“Tony will be based out of our 39 Herbert St, St Leonards office in NSW.

Tony has the experience, the industry contacts and the enthusiasm to help Dahua become a leader in the Australian CCTV market

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● Special report

Camera shootout

Entry ID cemeras

Camera Shootout Last month Scentre Group’s National CCTV Camera Shootout was held at Westfield in Bondi Junction. This is the largest CCTV camera shootout of its type in Australia, with the diverse mall environment giving attendees plenty to think about across 4 camera groups.

22 se&n

E often rattle on about objective camera testing in SEN and we do this because there is absolutely nothing that highlights strengths and weaknesses of performance more clearly than lining up a group of cameras in generally identical circumstances and seeing which image looks best. The challenge is getting all the latest cameras in one place – even more difficult, providing a series of real world applications that allow adequate conditions for comparison.

Organised by Scentre Group, the National CCTV Camera Shootout was held at Westfield Bondi Junction. The shootout covered 4 categories including entry ID, common mall, micro dome and a new category, omnidirectional cameras, which was tested in the carpark in extremely challenging light conditions.

W

by j o h n a d a m s

What we are looking at broadly is image quality, colour rendition, and whether the image is fit for our purpose, if not, that’s a fail.

A particular difficulty for manufacturers participating in the Scentre Group CCTV Camera Shootout is that not only resolution but bandwidth are prescribed. We’ve seen at SecTech that manufacturers not corralled by specification have a tendency to shake out bitrate – sometimes hugely.

Scentre Group is strict and this tests the cameras in realistic ways.

According to Scentre Group’s Brett Edwards, everything reasonably possible and more had been done to keep things impartial between vendors and eliminate any unconscious bias.

“Cameras are installed at Scentre Group sites for 3 reasons – first comes public liability,” Edwards explains. “We need to ensure that claims are legitimate – if a camera can show a person had a shoelace untied, or there was a spillage on the floor, that’s an important attribute.”

“Secondly, we use our surveillance systems for security. We are finding more and more use for video surveillance surrounding customer experience. We use LPR for vehicles driving into our malls in case they are stolen or customers can’t find their car.

If you lose a child or laptop, we can find them by following their movements using our CCTV systems.

We had 550 million unique visits to our centres in Australia last year – we consider CCTV critical to our operations.”

When it comes to testing, Scentre Group’s performance yardstick is bolted to operational fundamentals.

“We look at how well you can differentiate bright colours outside and inside the centre - can operators see the road surface?” Yigal Shirin explains. “We look across the road at the fence – how straight is the fence in terms of lens distortion? How much pixellation is in the images under digital zoom? How much noise can we see. Sharpness is important and colour rendition, too. Something else we are concerned with is motion blur in areas of low light.”

According to Shirin, the parameters are universal for every camera in the test.

“For entry ID we stipulated resolution of 1080p, and a 2MB data stream,” he explains. “We provided a distance and target size, and we left it to the manufacturers to deliver the best camera with respect to WDR, backlight compensation, colour rendition.

“What we are looking at broadly is image quality, colour rendition, and whether the image is fit for our purpose, if not, that’s a fail. From there we look at each camera’s feature set and technical capabilities, finally we enter into commercial negotiations with a manufacturer and select one camera from

se&n 23

● Special report

Camera shootout When we look at night performance, things get interesting and show the balancing act CCTV camera manufacturers, installers and end users must play with the laws of physics.

each category for all our stores for the following 12 months.”

“As far as the way the shootout is going to go today, we have 4 categories and we’ll look at each of the cameras by category. The category I’m really excited about this year is omnidirectional – fisheye or multi-head - it’s the first time we’ve really looked at cameras with this capability and we have 6 cameras in that category,” says Simon Pollak. “After the shootout, Scentre Group will offer contracts to those camera manufacturers whose products performed best.

We have SEN’s test target Norman doing a spot of shopping in the mall today and his presence will give us a good opportunity to look at colour rendition and differentiation, contrast, sharpness and license plates. This is exciting stuff for CCTV propeller-heads. As we run through the camera groups none of the visitors has a clue which camera is which. Given we test quite a few cameras at SEN, something I’m personally keen to discover is whether our observations of camera performance are replicated.

The Editor’s Opinion The whole idea of the shootout is to allow attendees to rate the cameras being tested in real time and here I’m going to give SEN’s opinion on which cameras we thought did best. Other people with different operational concerns, including Scentre Group, may have different opinions on which was

24 se&n

Entry ID

the best camera in each of the categories under test. Other things to consider include the fact we viewed the test on 2 monitors – the monitor in the main space looked to be older and its performance was less bright and less sharp than the monitor to the left. The images I took were from this monitor.

Further, my camera is set to bracket, taking one shot at 1/200th of a second, the next at 1/400th of a second. This impacts on colour rendition. I selected the comparison images I thought were best for further comparison, regardless of how my camera rendered the monitor.

We start out looking at the entry cameras installed to secure face recognition of customers coming in through main doors around the mall perimeter. This is a tough application – there’s significant backlight to cope with yet the cameras are installed perhaps 15m from the entry way so they must balance exposure for internal and external scenes. This is difficult to do, demanding a combination of auto shutter and processing input and we see that some cameras manage it better than others. It’s rare to see a CCTV camera that will offer face recognition in an internal space, give good face recognition, then see through the entryway and out into the wide world. In this case, while the cameras are specifically tasked with snaring faces, getting a view of the footpath, the street, even across the street, offers considerable value for investigations.

All cameras are focused to a point just inside the entry. Camera 1 (Samsung SNB-6004P) is best with faces and natural colour rendition – the external view is over exposed, though the far side of the street is visible, it’s noisy. Camera 7 (Hikvision DS2cd4025fwd) offers good face recognition, too, though colours are more saturated. It offers more balanced exposure across the street. Camera 2 (Panasonic WV-SPN631) offers good face recognition, though images are not as sharp and colours are more muted. It handles the external exposure well but its lens is generating widespread CAs. Camera 6 (Axis M1125) is also offering usable face recognition and a very balanced exposure – probably the best of the whole group. But latitudinal and longitudinal CAs with this camera’s lens are costing sharpness – chromatic aberrations are 10-12 pixels deep – that’s way too high. There’s also some blur evident on movement inside the mall. Cameras 3 (Arecont AV2116DNV1), 4 (Sony SNC-EB630B) and 5 (Bosch Dinion IP 6000 Starlight HD) are exposing

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● Special report

Camera shootout way over the street. Camera 3 has gone to night mode and its monochrome image is reasonable with static images but showing too much blur for recognition of pedestrians. Camera 4 is in lovely colour and is showing great rendition, sharpness, depth of field and low levels of blur. Reflections are well handled.

This image is thoroughly court admissible. Camera 5 is giving very natural colour rendition but showing CAs. There’s good depth of field and mild motion blur which is costing face recognition but giving full detail of colour, skin colour, etc. Camera 5 is doing well with static objects but there’s some blur with walking pedestrians. Camera 6 is another strong image – colour, low motion blur, strong depth of field and high tolerance for strong reflections. It’s getting face recognition without drama through the glass doors in areas of low reflection. Camera 7 is in colour but is the noisiest image of the group. Handling of reflections off the door is not quite as good as some others. It looks like we have face recognition along with full detail of clothing. Cameras 2 and 6 are the pick here.

for the external scene and are giving face recognition outside but not inside the entry way.

With Norman in the doorway, Camera 1 is doing well. Camera 2 is doing the best in terms of face recognition and viewing across the road. Zooming in on detail of Norman’s contrast bars shows excellent sharpness and contrast separation. Camera 3 is great across the road but Norman is not rendered so well. There’s also some motion blur in pedestrians outside the door. Camera 4 is doing well with pedestrians but Norman’s face is in shadow within the entry as the camera is exposing for the external light level. Camera 5 is doing extremely well over the road and reasonably well just inside the entry but things are a little dark internally. The closeup of Camera 6 on Norman’s contrast bars highlights the CAs being generated by this camera’s lens. The wide view has high levels of detail externally but the internal scene under digital zoom is soft and darker.

Camera 7 is best with Norman, pedestrians and over the road in this moment in time, though there’s a hint of motion blur inside.

Looking at camera performance outside the entry way as a priority, Camera 7 is offering the best balance and Camera 4 the best detail, colour rendition and contrast externally.

When we look at night performance, things get interesting and show the balancing act CCTV camera manufacturers, installers and end users must play with the laws of physics. Camera 1 is in colour but things are dark and there’s not a huge amount of external detail to be seen. Anything directly in the doorway will be discernible to a varying degree.

Camera 2 is outstanding in low light. The image is bright, blur is low, it’s handling reflections off the glass doors well and we can see pedestrians and cars clearly on the entry side of the road, and all the

26 se&n

General Mall Domes Next, we look at general mall domes. It’s a typical tough mall application. Deep field of view, wide angle of view, complex scenes, lots of movement, highly reflective floors, variable lighting, with multiple hotpoints. All these wide angle domes have considerable barrel distortion – I’m going to guess it’s between 12-15 per cent for most. Wide angles on standard HD resolutions make for pixel spread, which makes for softer images. The laws of physics cannot be un-made. Furthermore, lens quality with compact domes tends to be less exacting and there’s interference from dome bubbles. All these factors make it tough to pick the best performance. You wind up selecting on the basis of something obvious in the view – obviously higher resolutions or lower blur levels. Finer details are not so easy to discern and the scenes are so complicated they always incorporate good and bad elements of performance.

Camera 1 (Panasonic WV-SFN531) is showing a cool blue colour rendition. Angle of view is wide. There are CAs costing sharpness as you digitally zoom into the scene. The floors are causing mild overexposure.

There’s court admissible face recognition towards 15m that is better closer to the lens and softens as you go in. Camera 2 (Pelco IMP229-1IS) is giving more detail through improved contrast and lower CAs – the image itself is similarly soft. There’s face recognition towards 15m but it’s never sharp. Handling of strong light is better. Depth of field is better. The operator digitally zooms in on a cup of coffee on a table at around 10m from the lens and you know what the shape is but there’s no specific detail.

Camera 3’s (Bosch Flexidome IP 5000 Indoor HD) image is a little soft throughout – including close up - but deeper in it shows slightly more detail than the other 2 we’ve viewed. I would put this down to

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● Special report

Camera shootout

a lessor lens and a higher resolution. The image is a bit unbalanced, being in parts darker and in parts overexposed. The zoomed image also reveals some motion blur. Camera 4 (Arecont AV2255PMIR-SH) is reasonable in the foreground, a little over-exposed with the tiles. Face recognition is lost before 12m but depth of field is reasonably good. Blur seems low.

The digital zoom shows that good colour rendition and contrast are covering for a little softness here. There’s plenty to see in the background. It’s a deep scene, remember – 35m to the back of the supermarket.

Camera 5 (Samsung SND-6083) has more barrel distortion, low blur, strong colour rendition and good contrast. It’s still soft, even close to the lens.

You are not getting sharp face recognition from any of these domes even at quite close ranges. There’s some over-exposure in the image and it’s less sharp in the middle distance. The zoom shows this again – once inside the store, you’re not getting a lot of detail.

Camera 6 (Axis P3225-V) has a cool blue colour temperature. It’s handling reflection from the floor tiles the best, handling lights the best and has the highest resolution and sharpness. Barrel distortion is strong-ish at full wide. There are some CAs but detail is the highest so far. Colour balance is the best, too. The scene is rendered very evenly without much in the way of processing noise. The digital zoom confirms that detail levels are highest with this camera and that blur is well controlled.

Camera 7 (Sony SNC-EM630) is also a strong performer. Blur is low. Resolution is high. Detail is

28 se&n

high. There’s some processing noise in the image.

Barrel distortion is low. Sharpness is good close in and holds towards 20 metres. Digital zoom confirms the high levels of detail.

Camera 8 (Hikvision DS-2cd4125fwd-IZ) has nice colour rendition, low blur even at close range. Digital zoom is quite good, too, but levels of detail are not as high as Cameras 6 and 7. In appearance the camera is re-rendering detail digitally. Digital zoom on Camera 8 at close ranges is quite good, though I can see some digital artefacts.

I’d rate Camera 6 best and Camera 7 next with not much in it between these 2 – colour temp is the main difference, with Camera 6 tending to cool.

Camera 6 performs best with Norman, confirming its superiority in resolution. Cameras 6 and 7 are the most uniform in low light, too, best is 7, then 6, with Camera 8 running third.

Micro domes

General mall domes

Next come micro domes and these face a tough challenge, too. The tiny form factor means a small sensor and economisation of the camera system, while the challenging operational demands (long, wide scenes, movement at right angles, strong distant backlight, low light) are diametrically opposed to the required compromises of capability and you see this as soon as the group image comes up. All these cameras are soft. Blur is an issue with many, too, as is WDR performance. In the distance, there’s light streaming through an entry and given their location in the corridor, all the cameras are

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● Special report

Camera shootout high. Camera 6 (Arecont AV2555DN-S) has good colour rendition but is softer than others. WDR performance is not as strong. Camera 7 (Sony SNCXM631) is soft but has good WDR performance and colour rendition.

Next, we do a shoe-lace test which indicates whether resolution and motion blur are controlled well enough to see if laces are tied in good light.

Cameras 2 and 5 manage this. With Norman in the scene cameras 2, 5 and 7 show themselves to have the best digital zoom – Camera 5 is best of all. In low light, Camera 7 and Camera 1 are best with Camera 6 having gone to night mode but performing well.

Camera 5 is next in performance. Next, we run through digital zoom in low light conditions and at about 6m from the lens all the cameras but one, which is showing a very murky image, do quite well.

Micro domes

Omnidirectional cameras

Micro domes

exposing for the internal view and over exposing for the external.

Camera 1 (Bosch Microdome IP 5000 HD) looks good. Sharpness is not bad. WDR is quite good, too.

Blur is mild. Colour rendition is good. Even up close you are not getting sharp images with this camera but detail is certainly court admissible. There’s plenty of barrel distortion – maybe 15 per cent but it’s less than the rest. The zoom down the hall into light shows fundamental details but the blooming of backlight prevents longer views.

Camera 2 (Panasonic WV-SFN130) also has considerable barrel distortion, which is changing the shape of the scene and subjects within it. This camera is sharper – enough for face ID, I think, certainly enough to see an untied shoelace at close range - and WDR performance is better but that’s a relative thing. The image is cool blue but there’s reasonable colour rendition. Digital zoom proves the enhanced WDR performance but also shows the shortcomings of compact camera designs.

Camera 3 (Axis M3045-V) has nice colour rendition and exhibits almost no motion blur with pedestrians moving at right angles very close to the lens. Backlight performance at optical wide angle and digital zoom are extremely good. You’re not seeing faces near the entry but you have situational awareness. Camera 4 (Samsung SNV-L6013R) is showing motion blur indicative of reduced frame rate and pedestrians close to the lens moving at right angles have a double head. The image is softer than the other 2 and WDR is less capable than Camera 3 but it’s still good.

Camera 5 (Pelco IWP221-1ES) is the sharpest so far.

Colour rendition is good, though WDR is no better than the others and barrel distortion is similarly 30 se&n

The final camera group is the omnidirectional cameras and these are installed in a row in the carpark of the mall. At night, the scene is dark and very dark. During the day, it’s dark in some places and very bright in other places, with buckets of WDR. Viewing angles are huge, depth of field is

● Special report

Camera shootout

cavernous. Calling performance is tough with these cameras because of their different approach to the challenges of offering wide views – it’s no apples to apples match. There are a couple of 360-degree hemispheric cameras and alongside them are a number of multi-head cameras. We are viewing in Milestone XProtect with each of these multi-head camera views shown as a separate tile – this is the way such cameras are used by Scentre Group. Such images can also be stitched into a single panoramic view.

Camera 1 (Panasonic WV-SFV481) is a hemispheric.

We start viewing looking straight down but the operator steers the view up towards the horizon so we can look around in 360 degrees. The horizon is a little low and impacts on viewing distance very deep into scenes but the images are quite strong closer in – there’s obvious distortion on screen, even though the image has been de-warped. Context is not fundamentally altered but angles are changed.

WDR performance is challenged by the dark interior and bright exterior. Resolution is reasonably good, given the monstrous 360-degree viewing angle.

Camera 2 (Pelco IMM12036-1EP) is a multi-head and performance is different. Multi-heads each have HD resolutions but the lenses on these heads are wide so there’s some stretch and some softness.

There’s some over exposure in areas of bright external light. There’s no face recognition of Norman at about 20m. Camera 3 (Arecont AV12275DN-28) is another multi-head. It shows barrel distortion, motion blur, relatively unbalanced images between light and dark, and it battles with WDR. Colour is quite heavily saturated.

Camera 4 (Samsung SNF-8010P) is a fisheye, with de-warped image streams. De-warping has an impact on images – there’s leaning-back distortion and the heavy processing demand tends to cause some motion blur. There’s some noise in this image, too. Depth of field is reasonably good but backlight adjacent to a dark interior generates biblical levels of blooming. We have Norman in one scene – the angle of view is simply enormous but detail of Norman is hard to come by. Again, this sort of camera works great in a store or foyer – installing one in a huge underground carpark asks questions resolution cannot answer. I wish Mobotix had brought a camera for comparison.

Camera 5 (Axis P3707-PE) is the best we’ve seen so far. This is a multi-sensor camera. There’s barrel distortion but colour rendition is good and lighting balance works well, too. Ok, we have face recognition for the first time. A motorbike rides by and there’s good control of blooming, too. And WDR! And detail of Norman! License plates of cars! Depth of field is solid. Some CAs but that happens.

Camera 6 (Bosch IP 7000 MP) is another panoramic. It has a quite low horizon – this camera needs to be installed high or on walls. The images are flattened and stretched by de-warping. Colour

32 se&n

Omnidirectional cameras

Running through the same group at night is interesting.

Performance is better without backlight in all cases.

rendition is very natural. WDR performance is good. Resolution is pretty good. There’s some amplification noise. Depth of field is decent, too.

SEN’s opinion in this category is that Camera 5 is the best of the multi-head cameras and Camera 1 is the best of the panoramics.

Running through the same group at night is interesting. Performance is better without backlight in all cases. We also play with zoom a bit more, which gives a better sense of investigative capability. It’s 1.20am in the morning, so the only light is artificial – LED and fluoro given the colour temperature.

Camera 1 shows the same pattern of de-warping stretch and flattening. Depth of field is ok, image is generally soft, as most hemispherics are at wide angle. But zoom into the scene digitally and you get LPR at close and mid-ranges and probably face recognition, too, though we did not see it as no one was around. This tends to suggest the way we are viewing the images is impacting on appearance.

The raw resolution is actually there. The further in you zoom the noisier and more smudgy the image gets but LPR remains and geometric perspective normalises. Looking up the driveway without 80,000 lux of daylight streaming in gives an idea of true depth of field – it’s pretty good. You are not getting plates or faces past 15-20m but you have situational awareness at the scene edges.

Camera 2 has gone to night mode in the gloomy carpark. The image is relatively noisy for a monochrome image and there’s some blooming relating to the strip lighting, even at distances of 1520m. You are getting plates and getting them deeper than a hemispheric and at oblique angles. View

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● Special report

Camera shootout 360-degree shot at 1.24am, which shows good colour rendition and sharpness, as well as low noise and low blooming. Given this, night performance seems certain to mirror the quality of its daytime performance. There will be characteristic compression distortion in the presentation of dewarped images but depth of field is likely to be quite strong for its type. After going through the night recordings, we also undertook a WDR test using Norman and the best performers were Camera 1, Camera 5 and Camera 6.

Conclusions The core conclusion I drew after the event was that in the real world, with constraints on price and bandwidth, things are challenging for manufacturers, suppliers, integrators and end users.

Parameters like cost butt heads with performance and certain applications have demands so specific it’s challenging for cameras to offer the operational flexibility required through a 24-hour cycle.

Regardless, it was possible to discern which cameras did better, although in a couple of cases there were setup issues that certainly saw otherwise capable cameras hamstrung in the conditions they faced.

That’s the challenge of camera shootouts.

According to Pollak, part of the reason Scentre Group undertakes its National CCTV Camera Shootout is that as an organisation it is committed to “bringing the bar up across the industry” when it comes to technical excellence.

“The more the end users, consultants, integrators and vendors take into account operational performance vectors, the better it works out for everyone,” Pollak says. “We’d like to thank Simon Syamando from JSC for putting in many nights of work getting the system set up – he did a great job with the installation. Scentre Group also extends a big thank you to all the vendors and integrators involved in building this test solution. We understand it takes a lot of time to get a very large shootout like this together on a working site and we are grateful for all your efforts.” n

General mall domes

4 of Camera 2 is the most revealing. The depth of field has really opened up. Contrast is good. You are getting car make and model at 35m and more, and situational awareness is strong. We can see all the way to the carpark perimeter.

Camera 3 has stayed in colour when it should not have done, as things are gloomy. I’m not sure whether the camera is set to auto or locked in day mode. Annoyingly, the image actually looks to have considerable detail in it but it’s just too dark an image to see. Camera 4 is soft and noisy and is challenged by lights in the generally dark carpark. To handle the gloom, shutter speed has backed off and that means bright points are prone to blooming.

Camera 5 offers a bright image with some noise.

There’s characteristic distortion. Sharpness is good – licence plates are obtainable at wide and tele zoom angles. This camera has some blooming and some flare in the lens and dome bubble but there’s good depth of field and colour rendition is solid, considering the patchy light and when compared to competitors. Night performance is not as strong as Camera 2, which is in night mode.

Camera 6 is another hemispheric but for some reason SEN has not got images of this camera’s performance characteristics aside from a single

34 se&n

Omnidirectional cameras

● Special report

SAGE

Security & Government Expo

Security and Government Expo took place in Canberra last month, with a good crowd taking a look at the latest security solutions and hearing DFAT’s Luke Williams speak. SAGE major industry sponsor ASIS ACT held a concurrent dinner, which was very well attended.

n

SECURITY and Government Expo 2016 had a distinctly operational focus, with most exhibitors offering government personnel, end user and integrator visitors solutions designed to resolve key challenges within their organisations, or their customer’s organisations.

The inaugural event drew 226 visitors to the Realm Hotel in 6 hours and organiser Monique Keatinge said there was plenty of positive feedback across the board.

“SAGE will be back at the Realm Hotel in 2017 with an expanded programme,” Keatinge said. “Space is tight, so exhibitors wanting to guarantee a position next year should email monique@bridgepublishing. com.au and confirm their participation.”

36 se&n

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● Regulars

The Interview

David Lenz, CEO Hills Ltd (left) with Philippe Ouimette, country manager, ANZ - Genetec and Charles Cousins, managing director, Asia Pacific Japan, Physical Security - Genetec

Open Plan Genetec is leaning into the Australian market, enhancing its relationship with local distributor Hills and expanding the team on the ground as its local business and its product portfolio continue to grow. John Adams spoke with Genetec’s Charles Cousins, MD Asia Pacific Japan, new country manager Philippe Ouimette and Hills’ David Lenz about plans for growth.

38 se&n

Q: Could you give readers some background of the Genetec history in the Australian market?

Charles: Genetec got involved in 2009 – at the time Genetec was distributed in Australia by OPS, which was getting blue chip customers and had grown from 4 staff to 30. OPS was then acquired by Hills and we have successfully partnered with Hills since then.

For the past 2 years the growth has been in high double digits – much faster than the market is growing. We now want to inject more activity into the Australian market. We have appointed a country manager from Genetec in Montreal, Phillipe Ouimette. Phillipe joined Genetec 3 years ago and being married to an Australian and having worked in Australia for 3 years in the late 90s, he made it clear when he joined

D av i d L e n z , P h i l i pp e O u i m e t t e a n d C h a r l e s C o u s i n s w i t h J o h n Ad a m s

he was happy to work in Australia if an opportunity came up, which it did.

Phillipe inherits a successful Genetec business with high visibility.

What we like about the Australian market is the similarity in security values to Canada and the U.S. Here it’s reliability, robustness, redundancy, support and perhaps then you get to price. We see so much momentum, a fabulous pipeline, great products coming out of Montreal - we are looking to move way beyond record and playback. It’s the right time to have a new country manager to drive it forward.

Q: How does Hills feel about Genetec’s investment in increased staff levels?

For some time boots on the ground was engineering support – will this development assist the Hills effort?

David Lenz: Yes, it certainly will. From Hills’ perspective we are very excited about the future of the Genetec and Hills partnership in Australia. From our point of view there has been a lot of investment in the brand and we are seeing complementary investment from Genetec that will make us even stronger in the market. We have a good strategic fit and Genetec has some very clear goals about how they plan to assist with facilitating growth. We’re excited about the investment taking place. Thanks to the Genetec SDK there is the ability to do more locally in terms of development – Genetec goes about the process of integrating development in a very structured way – what we do here goes back onto the world stage.

Q: What has your role been since joining Genetec, Phillipe?

Phillipe: For the last 3 years I was director of the global alliance team, which is essentially taking care of all the technical partnerships we have around the world. I joined the company 3 years ago and was employee 600 and we are about to break 1000 employees so there’s been a lot of growth in the past 3 years. It’s changing – how do we grow while maintaining that innovative start-up mentality moving forward, that nimbleness?

We think about these things on a day to day basis – we think about structuring the company in a way where it is driven by transversal applications, to grow but

Genetec goes about the process of integrating development in a very structured way – what we do here goes back onto the world stage. to retain what we call villages within the company – small teams through which we hope to keep that spirit of innovation and ability to pivot quickly.

Q: Could you outline the plans for the Australian market?

Phillipe: What we are seeing is that Genetec is known in the region as a VMS platform and a lot of our sales are driven from that area but the platform is evolving and it’s now much more than that. How do we work with our partner to be better equipped to sell the whole portfolio of Genetec products? How do we educate the market so it can better absorb new technology?

Bridging that gap will be a big focus of the next 3 years. Where the industry is moving is towards connectivity. IP video was IoT before that name was coined.

As we start securely connecting more intelligent devices to our platform it becomes more than the sum of its parts and this accelerates the types of products we are bringing to market – educating the market on where we are now is a big part of why we are injecting resources into the Australian market.

It’s good for the company and good to have ties into the office in Montreal, to keep the engineers on top of what’s happening in the Australian market, the uniqueness of the market and how we build that into the products going forward.

Part of the role is being that interface between Australia and Canada. Our R&D is in Canada – we have more than 300 engineers working on our software development – they’ve been focused on core products but we now have other applications other than physical security.

We also have around 100 engineers in Paris, France.

Q: What’s the percentage of lateral applications outside the traditional security video surveillance market?

Phillipe: It’s considerable – we’re not trying to take them all on at once but we have launched an out-of-the-box

solution in the retail business that will be announced early next year – you still need existing cameras and a VMS to support this product but it will give intelligence to be fed back to the marketing department to enhance retail sales. The data is there already but is not available in a digestible format. This system offers charts and graphs that will be generated automatically.

For instance, when we think of airports, we don’t just think of security – we are thinking of passenger flow through the airport, how do we help retail outlets be more efficient, how do we improve management of parking facilities, how do we help baggage handlers work more efficiently.

There are now products including Mission Control, which ties all the information coming from data points, including cameras, access control, LPR, alarm inputs, voice communications and guides an operator through a series of digitised procedures so that operators faced with particular situations are guided to the appropriate response by the software. It can be used for training, for auditing of performance and takes the emotion out of decision making.

Q: Cloud is a major focus for Genetec and has been for some years. What are the plans there?

Phillipe: As we keep developing new products we continue our focus on cloud first. Security Center has traditionally run on-premise but today Security Center is available in the cloud on a subscription basis. It allows you to offset computing costs to the cloud, saving on energy costs, space. It’s a change for the enterprise space.

It’s supported by Microsoft Azure, which has just opened a new data centre here in Australia.

Having a cloud first model allows us to bring new products to market more quickly. One of the latest products we have released, called Clearance, is a totally cloud-based digital evidence management platform for law enforcement customers.

Law enforcement needs to correlate video from body worn cameras with mobile phone footage from bystanders, adjacent surveillance cameras and the like. Clearance allows them to do this in the cloud securely. It’s agnostic, standalone, can be run on any VMS, authenticates users,

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● Regulars

The Interview

Phillipe Ouimette

As we keep developing new products we continue our focus on cloud first.

creates an audit trail so you can see who has accessed the video. The security of security solutions is something we are focussed on, too.

Q: Where do you see growth in cloud?

Phillipe: Our first cloud product was Stratocast and over the past 2 years it has taken on a life of its own. An example is Project Greenlight in Detroit, a city which has a problem with crime so that even the mayor expressed fear of going to a service station for fear of getting mugged. The city wanted CCTV but was bankrupt. So the idea was to approach private businesses to subscribe to Stratocast and then federate those video streams back to a central police station for monitoring.

Service stations connected with Project Greenlight are provided a solid green light to display out the front of their premises.

Customers feel safer stopping there because they know police are watching.

Outlay costs are low as the cameras are already installed, there was no cost to the city. The subscription costs are also low, so everybody wins. We see this model replicating itself – it’s already starting to mushroom.

Charles: A similar application is installed in Mongolia where they have odd-number

40 se&n

and even-number days to mitigate traffic congestion. If an odd number is seen on an even number day, footage is sent to a control room for actioning.

In NZ, we looked at a project that was designed to monitor vehicles that were circling particular sensitive sites. There’s no end to such applications.

Q: Is your development customerdriven or are there other inputs into the product pipe?

Phillipe: Certainly yes but sometimes no. Genetec was a pioneer – we have been in IP video for 20 years. Back then, people thought it was silly to stream IP video over networks, but the industry has changed. The same thing applies to cloud today - 5 years ago, people said cloud could not be done but things have changed and it now is possible to manage CCTV using cloud. We are an innovative company and that means we don’t always listen to the customer – instead we look ahead to see where the industry is going. The security industry is a little conservative, after all.

Q: What sorts of products and functionalities have Genetec customers prompted?

Phillipe: Huge numbers of functionalities and all the time. Retail analytics is a key thing. Retail loss managers were looking for a greater ROI on their surveillance systems. Same applies to Mission Control – Customers were getting video streams and wondering – what’s next? Video is fundamental to most security procedures – alarm events, fire alarms, access control exceptions.

Charles: Of course, systems sold today incorporate the capabilities of everything everyone has learned and integrated into their system over many years of product development – people are not reinventing their systems but sharing the best operational capabilities between them.

Q: Is there anything you’d like to say to integrators, consultants and end users in the Australian market – what can they expect from Genetec in 2017?

Phillipe: We are excited about where things are going – we are growing, we are investing in Australia and we are looking forward to bringing new products to market in Australia. We have added the ability to bring together large applications, we’ve added some BDM capability - you’ll be hearing a lot more from us over the next 12 months. n

● New product

Vivotek

Vivotek Streams H.265 Vivotek’s Smart Stream II is a new generation compression technology developed by VIVOTEK which allocates more bandwidth to streaming moving objects or regions of interest, resulting in optimized resource usage. To leverage Smart Stream II, Vivotek has released new cameras, NVRs and software.

MART Stream II is fully compatible with the H.265 standard, requires no additional playback integration, and can also be configured to use a combination of both ROI and automatic movement detection. By adopting VIVOTEK’s Smart Stream II and H.265 technology, this new technology can lower bandwidth and storage requirements by up to 80 per cent while preserving the detail of moving objects and not sacrificing video quality. Smart Stream II is designed for remote surveillance or other scenarios where available network bandwidth may be limited or unknown.

VIVOTEK’s H.265 series cameras are new professional H.265 high-efficiency indoor/outdoor network cameras in versatile types, offering 30~60 fps @ up to 5-Megapixel resolution. Employing H.265 technology enables these cameras to provide higher and more efficient image compression rates than previous H.264 systems. In addition, VIVOTEK’s sophisticated Smart Stream II technology enables the camera to optimize resolution for a desired

S

Smart Stream II is designed for remote surveillance or other scenarios where available network bandwidth may be limited or unknown.

42 se&n

object or area and therefore to maximize efficiency of bandwidth usage.

VIVOTEK has been working in close collaboration with Genetec to develop seamless integration for its H.265 cameras to ensure performance and compatibility with Genetec Security Center, a unified platform that blends IP video surveillance, access control, and license plate recognition systems within one intuitive solution. By adopting H.265 technology, VIVOTEK and Genetec users can substantially save on costs due to the higher image compression rates, which reduce bandwidth and storage consumption.

While the technology which brings this breakthrough to users is extremely advanced, they can access its benefits by simply switching on the Smart Stream II feature on VIVOTEK’s H.265 network cameras.

VIVOTEK H.265 series network cameras are also equipped with WDR Pro and SNV which allow cameras to better handle challenging lighting conditions. Additionally, IP66/67/68-rated housings for outdoor cameras ensures the ability of these advanced cameras to withstand rain and dust.

The cameras’ IK10-rated housing can also provide protection against acts of vandalism and other impacts.

In order to enhance low light surveillance, VIVOTEK has also released 3 new H.265 IR speed dome cameras all equipped with 20x/30x optical zoom lens and VIVOTEK’s latest VAIR technology, cameras can automatically adjust the IR angle of the IR illuminators (up to 250 meters) to match the camera’s FOV (Field Of View), allowing longer distance and highly uniform IR intensity. Compared with standard IR illuminators with fixed IR distances, VIVOTEK’s new IR speed domes ensure maximum image details are captured in extreme low light situations.

There are 3 more H.265 outdoor speed dome cameras equipped with 20x/ 30x optical zoom lens, WDR Pro technology, IP68, IK10, NEMA 4X housing, and -40°C and 55°C wide operating temperatures, offering robust day and night protection. As well as these advanced network cameras, VIVOTEK has released 4 H.265 compatible NVRs, include the 64-channel NR9681, 32-channel ND9541and NR9581, and 16-channel ND9441. These NVRs fully support H.265 video compression technology and up to 48TB storage capacity with 8 hard disk trays, which combine to offer 30-50 per cent more recording capacity compared to H.264 solutions. n

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Other trademarks mentioned herein are the property of their respective owners.

1300 319 499 csd.com.au VIC: Mulgrave, Tullamarine NSW: Northmead, Waterloo ACT: Fyshwick QLD: Loganholme SA: Marleston WA: Balcatta

● Special report

Access control

Affordable Access Control In years past, the notion of affordable access control usually meant significant functional compromise.

No longer. It’s now possible to source highly capable access control solutions that offer integrators and end users affordability, functionality and flexibility.

RGUABLY the biggest winner in the shift to new technology has been affordable access control. In this market segment, a combination of must-have modular functionalities merge with mobile and browser-based interfaces to deliver something bigger than the sum of parts. In many ways, the affordable access control market is everything the domestic security and automation market is struggling to be. Why the difference? Because SMEs need reliable and wellsupported access control and intrusion detection solutions, while residential users are driven almost exclusively by price.

The baseline demand from SMEs has seen the development of a group of excellent access control and automation solutions that leverage new technology in every way they can to lower costs, increase functionality and simplify installation and system management. For manufacturers, end users and installers, this development has been win-win.

The product group is relatively diverse when it comes to technology but very similar in terms of functionality. Solutions include Inner Range Inception, Paxton net2 Plus, CS Technologies Evo and ICT Protege WX. Other systems tapping into the same market drivers include Salto. All these systems are economical, easy to manage and easy to install, while giving users almost all the functionalities of larger solutions on single sites.

Inner Range Inception is the latest offering. It features 4 doors onboard with LAN expansion to 32, 8 SIFER readers onboard with expansion to 64, expansion for 32/64 Wiegand readers, 32 areas, 8 alarm inputs (LAN expansion to 512), 4 outputs

A

44 se&n

(LAN expansion to 512), 2000 users and a 50,000 event log. The system is supported by the Inner Range– Paradox RF module and RF devices, and local control is via the compact Elite LCD keypad.

“The aim of development has been to simplify the application of intruder and access control, to be an introduction for non-Inner Range users,” Inner Range’s Inception team leader, Steve Mitchell, explains.

“Inception is the product that any tech can pick up within a couple of hours and is designed to draw competitor users towards the Inner Range family.

“For systems of 4, 8 and even 32 doors installers don’t need a lot of complex processing and logic. Recognising this, we try to use common terminology alongside Inner Range terminology and programming structures, so as to make the system easier to approach.”

According to Mitchell, there’s no licensing – you simply buy the product and install it. The fact there’s no software because there’s a web interface contributes

By j o h n a d a m s

Paxton Net2

Paxton Net2 system allows for integration into many popular 3rd party brands and products including CCTV with Dahua, Hikvision, Nx Witness, Avigilon and Milestone...

CS Technologies Evo Controller

to the simplicity. The Commissioning Checklist, which leads the installer through the process of system setup, does make installation very simple.

Importantly, Inception uses a lot of integriti modules – an 8-zone expander and the 2-door access module. If you want more doors you buy more SLAMS, in you want more inputs you buy more 8-zone expanders. You can choose from different housings to suit the number of expanders you need.

“This entire web interface can be accessed from any authorised interconnected device as long as Inception has internet access,” he explains.

“And there’s a section of the checklist specifically devoted to establishing the parameters of use access to parts of the system for management and oversight.”

As well as managing access and alarms, Inception can also handle automation – for instance, when

an area is disarmed at a particular time of day, turn off the lights. The capability of this automation is actually very comprehensive but best of all it’s very simple to set up more complex automation events using and/or logic.

The Commissioning Checklist is not only highly intuitive but highly instructive. It’s not just that following the Commissioning Checklist guarantees a perfect installation – the process itself, which incorporates context-based help tiles - increases installer knowledge by explaining each step as you go.

According to James Robinson of ICT, the size of the affordable access control market – from 2-50 doors – isn’t easy to quantify but he believes it’s growing fast.

“Market size is a great question but it’s a little hard to put a number,” Robinson says. “I will say that this part of the market is growing exponentially – end users are becoming more educated and they understand

se&n 45

● Special report

Access control

Inception is the product that any tech can pick up within a couple of hours and is designed to draw competitor users towards the Inner Range family. that the data of a security system can be a great tool in any business.

The key technical features of ICT’s Protege WX platform include 1-128 doors (256 readers), the ability to handle 512 inputs and outputs for security and automation functions, and 8 elevator cars, each handling 32 floors. The system also has a full suite of programmable functions built in, allowing for logic control and automation in its own right but also it’s equipped with an interface for Cbus and SAVANT. There’s also a fully open (and free) automation and control protocol available making integration with any automation platform a breeze for someone with the technical capability to do so.

From the point of view of installers and end users, which general characteristics are most important at this level of the market? Ease of installation and commissioning? Simplicity of operation? Absence of licensing fees? All these and more?

According to Robinson, installers and end users have 2 very different use cases for these products.

“For integrators, ease of installation and commissioning is definitely high on the priority list, in these projects product selection and time to install and commission impact on the margin made from a project, so having a product that goes in and works is very important,” he says.

“I also think for an integrator the fact a product is simple to operate for the end user is also very important. Much time (often at no charge to anyone other than the company installing) is consumed in training and re-training end users on how to perform simple functions.”

Robinson argues that end user use of computers and computer-driven devices has evolved significantly over the last 5 years.

“End users are becoming much more technology savvy, to this end people are no longer afraid of computers and technology-rich devices,” Robinson explains. “If we look back to 5 years ago it would be very rare for an end user to perform the most basic functions of access control, like running a report on access or adding a user and giving them access to their facility.

“We are making systems that are much more user intuitive and following similar styles to “windows type” look and feel and it opens this world to end users, so simplicity of operation is definitely the major drawcard for end users. – The easier it is to use the more they will use it.

“When we look at how basic access control

46 se&n

is adopted in the market I think it’s fair to say people don’t mind paying for “advanced features and functionality, however, it’s important that our products deliver a core functionality at no additional cost other than the initial purchase – there is also an expectation that software updates should come at no cost. If users want it to do more than it does at its core they understand there are often costs associated with such services.”

How important in this part of the market are capabilities like video surveillance and automation in your experience?

“I think these features are quickly becoming more and more desired, for example a security system is a very logical place to start some basic level of automation – why leave lights turned on when the building is armed, the access platform can be programmed to turn these lights off and vice versa.

“At a CCTV level the current trend is to have a separate platform to handle this as there are many

more things to consider here such as storage, recording settings etc…, however, being able to see what is happening at a door from the access system is highly desirable.”

Robinson says more end users are choosing to interact with security solutions via mobile devices but installers are not so driven.

“For an end user having an app as part of the user experience is becoming mandatory,” he explains. “Being able to arm/disarm an alarm from a smart phone or even remotely open a door is a base expectation these days and the capabilities of apps and expectations on what an end user can do with a system are expanding exponentially. As manufacturers, we have to ensure we meet and exceed these expectations.

“At an integrator level I am not quite sure it is as relevant. Generally, an integrator is more focussed on initial configuration and setup of the platform, having day to day access with operation of a client site is generally left with the end user which is what

apps are designed for.”

What new releases does ICT have in the wings in 2017? What should we be looking out for?

“Without giving to much away we have several new products planned that will further extend the capabilities and reach of the WX product,” Robinson says. “It’s an even mix between new hardware products for integrators to use and new features, functions and services for the WX platform that our existing and new clients can adopt to further validate their investment in our products.”

Next in line is CS Technologies, which has specialised in this part of the market for more than 15 years by providing feature-rich intelligent controllers at very low cost. Another key aspect of CS Technologies’ offer is powerful free software, which further reduces the cost of the EVO range.

In terms of functionality, EVO 2 and 4 door boards combine access control, intrusion, lift control and automation; including tenant air conditioning control and integration to several CCTV systems, all from the one software platform.

Key technical features of the EVO access control solution include 2 or 4 door controllers with 4-way alarm boards. Being modular, both systems are hugely expandable with no need to swap out controllers. Out of the box, EVO2 2 door controller boards can have 2000 users, many access levels, public holidays, and time zones and on-board transaction memory is up to 1000 transactions. Meanwhile, EVO4 4 door controller boards can have 20,000 users, many access levels, public holidays and time zones, while on-board transaction memory is up to 20,000 transactions.

According to CS Technologies Chris Fitzpatrick, the characteristics most important at this level of the market revolve around ease of use for installer and the end user, but there are other things to consider.

“CS Technologies has worked very hard in the Australian market place to provide easy to use, install and program products for both the installer and the end user,” says Fitzpatrick. “The product was developed and enhanced from 15 years of feedback from the installers and end users to meet most of the suggested changes to make the overall experience of installing and working with the product easier. The software for the system is free and fully optioned - buy one board you get the complete software package able to communicate with hundreds of controllers or systems.”

When it comes to integration with video surveillance and automation, Fitzpatrick says integrating into one system helps sell the system.

“The end user wants to go to one interface to get all their security information,” Fitzpatrick says.

“Being able to combine all functionalities together is a great selling point even if all possible features are not employed when the system is commissioned.

se&n 47

● Special report

Access control

“We think modern security solutions should integrate access control and CCTV, and in CS Technologies case this is at no additional cost.

Dahua, Hikvision and SPR have been interfaced to the Evolution management software so the end user can search one platform when searching for access control, automation or CCTV incidents.

“Supporting these functionalities, CS Technologies has had mobile applications for several years for iPhone, Android, PC and iPads to give our clients the ability to program the system and action events and drive automation from their mobile device. In 2017 we will be working to integration with more devices, as well as cloud data storage.

“We will be working on additional CCTV systems, as well as new POS software,” Fitzpatrick says. “We already have more than 50 completed integrations for market areas such as self-storage, 24-hour gyms, access to golf clubs and caravan parks, and plenty more. The next major addition will be storage in the cloud to operation of sites, buildings via the cloud.”

Another key player in affordable access control is Paxton and Wayne Krahner of local supplier, Security Distributors Australia, says the 2-50 door market covers the majority of access control systems installed - approximately 70-80 per cent of the market – and is a part of the market where Paxton Net2 is particularly strong.

“Paxton offers a range of intelligent door controllers that can connect to the LAN/WAN and can be powered by PoE and RS485 networks,” Krahner explains. “We also have a selection of wireless door controllers and door handles and the simplest software in the market.”

According to Krahner, the most important features of Paxton’s Net2 System include ease of installation.

“For a start, this product is very easy to learn, install

48 se&n

ICT WX Controller and app

and operate,” he says. “There are also no licencing fees whatsoever. You load the software on as many PCs as you like, register as many users as you want up to 50,000, and as many doors as you need up to 1000. Best of all, there’s a 5-year no quibble warranty – if the system breaks, no matter how it breaks, we will replace it free of charge.”

When it comes to integration of video surveillance and automation, Krahner says this is an important part of how Paxton Net2 can add value to any installation.

“Paxton Net2 system allows for integration into many popular 3rd party brands and products including CCTV with Dahua, Hikvision, Nx Witness, Avigilon and Milestone,” he explains. “Net2 also integrates with Traka key management, Texecom alarm systems, IEVO biometric readers and Clubware gym management software.

“Management using mobile devices is also becoming more popular and Paxton Net2 offers a range of apps that can open doors, as well as helping to manage roll call and mustering,” Krahner says.

“This is a growing area and Paxton will be offering more solutions in the near future.”

Designed to meet the unique demands of modern businesses, scalable systems from Interlogix can accommodate changing needs for optimal long-term security.

Learn more at www.interlogix.com.au

UTC Fire & Security Australia Pty Ltd trading as Interlogix is part of UTC Climate, Controls & Security. Š 2016 United Technologies Corporation, Inc. All rights reserved.

● Special report

Access control

According to Anthony Loh of EDS the affordable portion of the access control market in the 1 to 20door region incorporates a considerable part of the market in Australia - primarily small to medium sized businesses, though he points out there’s particular growth in the market surrounding apartment buildings.

“The key technical features of our solutions that cater for the 1 to 2-door market would be HID Edge EVO Solo Networked Controller and in the 10 to 32-door area, we have the Vertech Central Station Access Control software using HID Vertx EVO controllers,” Loh says. “Both these solutions are highly capable and thoroughly proven.”

VertX EVO V2000 is a 2-reader access control panel that enables interface with 2 doors (single reader) or one door (in/out reading). The EVO V2000 handles all online door decisions, door input monitoring and output control and reader interface for up to 2 doors. The solution has 2 inputs per door for door monitor and REX, and 2 outputs per door for lock and AUX. VertX EVO V2000 also includes 3 inputs for AC power fail, battery power fail and tamper, and is powered by a local power supply (12 or 24 VDC).

The system provides a complete and fully functional hardware/firmware infrastructure for access control software host systems. It enables the replacement of head end software without visiting the access control panel, reducing change out costs. V2000 stores a complete access control and configuration database for up 250,000 cardholders.

The solution connects to the host and other devices on a TCP/IP network, receives and processes real-time commands from the host software application, reports all activity to the host; reports supervised inputs /alarms with 255 priorities and provides fully functional offline operation when not actively communicating with the host access control software application, performing all access decisions and event logging.

Other features include an interface for 2 Wiegand or clock-and-data readers; inputs for 2 door monitors, 2 REX switches, AC fail, battery fail and tamper, non-latching relay outputs rated 2 A @ 30 VDC, 2 door strikes (configurable), 2 auxiliary devices (door held/forced alarm, alarm shunt, host offline (communication down), or general purpose).

When it comes to market drivers, Loh believes that while there are a number of characteristics that are important at this level of the market, price is the key.

“Lowest cost across the whole solution is really a major factor above all else in the small to medium market,” he explains. “Fancy features like OSDP, automation or analytics are not important at this level. Characteristics like ease of installation/ commissioning and less after hour/post-installation support are important because intrinsically they contribute to reduced cost.”

How important in this part of the market are

50 se&n

HID VertX

capabilities like video surveillance and automation in Loh’s experience?

“Video surveillance is important and especially the ability for self managed/remote viewing which is becoming more standard now,” he says. “Video analytics is probably not so important at this level, especially if there is a significant cost increase and automation wouldn’t be too important at this level either.”

When it comes to installer and user interfaces, Loh says there are changes.

“Interaction with mobile devices and IOT is definitely being required more these days and more businesses are heading towards smart offices,” he explains. “Video surveillance via mobile devices as well as mobile physical access using Bluetooth/NFC and HID readers will soon be able to be configured via a mobile app. So yes, there’s a big difference in the way users and installers expect to be able to manage access control devices that reflects increasing familiarity with smart mobile devices.”

When it comes to the year ahead, Loh says there are a number of solutions to keep an eye out for.

“There’s the HID Mobile Access Readers/Solution, the HID Bioclass SE reader, the HID U90 UHF reader with a special UHF ISO card (not self-powered), there’s HID EasyLobby Solo, which is a new standalone version visitor management solution, there’s the HID reader manager app, which allows configuration of reader functions including LED, buzzer, keypad outputs via a mobile app. We’re also looking forward to the IDCUBE Access360 access control solution with HID Vertx controllers.” n

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â—? Special report

IP cameras

Securing IP Cameras After the recent DDoS botnet attack, integrators and end users are right to be thinking seriously about securing IP cameras and the networks they run on. Fortunately, there are many practical measures that can be taken to harden devices exposed to local networks and the Internet.

HEN you’re thinking about securing IP cameras, the first thing to do is work on the password that gains access to the camera browser. Default user names and passwords like admin and admin, root and pass, admin and no password, admin and 123456 are a sure way to leave cameras open to hacking. Passwords are more difficult than they sound. They need to be

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complex enough to defy easy breaching and they need to be manageable. There’s nothing worse than losing a password and having to reset every device on a network, in effect recommissioning the system to re-gain communication. Passwords need to be managed and securely stored.

Cameras with weak or predictable passwords are more vulnerable when they reside on a shared

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● Special report

IP cameras

data network and not a secure CCTV subnet – this happens most often in SME businesses. Typically, larger organisations will need a subnet for cameras to ensure there are no dramas with traffic congestion. If a subnet is not possible then a VLAN is required – using a VLAN is always a good idea.

Depending on the security level of the network, a strong system password can be used for multiple cameras. Any cameras that are not on secure networks should have unique identifiers.

Supporting camera passwords are system passwords – the idea is that there are layers of security would-be hackers must get through.

System passwords need to be complex and they should be regularly changed. IP addresses that make multiple attempts to breach a password should be locked out. Behind system passwords are operating system passwords. The more passwords, the more secure, the harder to manage.

Most quality cameras have SSL encryption that can be activated if they are connected directly to the internet – make sure that this functionality is employed. This is particularly important if you’re hooking up to a cloud-based service. It’s not hugely complex – if a device has a direct connection to the Internet and is not protected by general system firewalls and encrypted passwords, then it needs to be protected to the level of the network frontline. A possible weakness of internet-connected DVRs and NVRs is that connections are not encrypted to an acceptable standard. A DVR without the capability for SSL is vulnerable to loss of passwords. Make sure SSL is activated for DVRs that are exposed to the internet.

Installing network devices directly to data network creates weaknesses in both directions.

The device may become an entry point for an attacker to get to the network and the shared network may become an entry point for the attacker to get to the device. It’s this fundamental that drives the need for secure subnets with the bare minimum of access points that are open to authorised users only. In defence applications, this may go so far as ensuring no part of the security network is connected to any Internet-connected network, only to a handful of local workstations. If access is required by a remote site in an emergency, it will be temporary and highly secure.

An increasingly common access point to IP cameras is through mobile devices and these devices are often unsecured themselves. They should be biometrically secured, with complex password support. Security settings should be activated and multiple attempts to enter a password, particularly if the phone uses a biometric, should result in lockout and possible blanking of the device, depending on the security level of the system the device can access.

Mobile device connection usually means some measure of port forwarding and the key thing

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An increasingly common access point to IP cameras is through mobile devices and these devices are often unsecured themselves.

here is to limit exposed ports and to protect them with tools that will detect attempts to breach unauthorised ports. The Internet is a jungle and network ports may be scanned thousands of times every day by would-be intruders seeking an access point. You want the exposed port to be defended by a firewall with an intrusion detection system that reports events and rejects malicious traffic.

Firewalls are a science of their own. If you’re using something like a Synology server with an integrated firewall in a store or small business, you might activate this yourself after some careful thought but rules-based firewalls are complicated and if you are serious about network security, then you’ll need help. Firewalls need careful config, they need to be kept up to date with the latest threats and they need to be monitored in the same way a perimeter intrusion detection solution is monitored.

A vulnerability that might not be considered is physical access to network rooms, which should be protected using the organisation’s access control and intrusion detection system. Something we’ve seen is DVRs or NVRs with no passwords just sitting out in common areas – not just in small retail stores but in hotels, shopping centres and sports grounds.

Node zero should be defended and all access to CCTV equipment should be logged.

Securing video surveillance solutions is something integrators and end users need to get serious about. The capability to undertake such target hardening has existing for a long time – we need to start deploying it – not only on new systems but on hundreds of thousands of brownfield sites as well. n

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Z-Wave Goes IoT The Z-Wave Alliance, an open consortium of leading global companies deploying the Z-Wave smart home standard, announced the addition of a security requirement to its longstanding interoperability certification.

HIS latest addition to the T certification program will require manufacturers to adopt the strongest levels of Internet of Things (IoT) security in the industry.

The Z-Wave Alliance Board of Directors voted to make the implementation of the new Security 2 (S2) framework mandatory for all products that are Z-Wave certified after April 2, 2017. The security measures in S2 provide the most advanced security for smart home devices and controllers, gateways and hubs in the market today, according to the Alliance.

The move follows the recent UL approval of the Z-Wave protocol for UL 1023 compliance, a move that is likely see Z-Wave become the wireless comms of choice for old and new manufacturers of security panels and security sensors. It’s a shift that over time could re-shape the entire nature of controller-based security solutions, nudging manufacturers towards wireless hubs. Adding security requirements nudges things forward a little further.

The Z-Wave Alliance, along with its

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Z-Wave’s S2 framework was developed in conjunction with cybersecurity hacking experts, giving the already secure Z-Wave devices, new levels of impenetrability

board of directors and members, says it has been working for the past several years to develop world-class security for its devices as the IoT expands into every modern household across the globe.

“This recent decision to make the S2 framework mandatory on all Z-Wave certified devices stems from a growing need for industry leadership in the smart home space to take the security and privacy of devices in the market seriously,” says Mitchell Klein, executive director, Z-Wave Alliance. “No one can afford to sit on their hands and wait — consumers deserve IoT devices in their home to have the strongest levels of security possible. IoT smart home technologies that don’t act will be left behind.”

Z-Wave’s S2 framework was developed in conjunction with cybersecurity

hacking experts, giving the already secure Z-Wave devices new levels of impenetrability, according to the Alliance.

By securing communications both locally for home-based devices and in the hub or gateway for cloud functions, S2 also removes the risk of devices being hacked while they are included in the network.

The Alliance says by using a QR or pin-code on the device itself, the devices are uniquely authenticated to the network as well. Common hacks such as man in the middle and brute force are virtually powerless against the S2 framework through the implementation of the industry-wide accepted secure key exchange using Elliptic Curve DiffieHellman (ECDH).

Z-Wave says it also strengthened its cloud communications, enabling the tunneling of all Z-Wave over IP traffic

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through a secure TLS 1.1 tunnel, removing vulnerability. The changes to Z-Wave’s technical certification program, which is administered through third-party test facilities in Europe, U.S. and Asia, first established to test and certify Z-Wave devices in 2005, will check that all S2 security solutions, which contain rules for command classes, timers and device types are correctly implemented.

Around a year ago, Z-Wave comms owner and developer, Sigma Designs kicked off the Z-Wave Security 2 framework for Z-Wave devices, which was developed with the support of UL specifically to give manufacturers of Z-Wave devices a 1023-compliant platform for the development of security sensors. And more recently, Sigma announced Z-Wave transceivers ZM5101, ZM5202, and ZM5304, which

feature protocol SDK version 6.60, and have been evaluated to UL’s standards for home security. The products feature anti-jamming and AES 128-bit encryption provisions. The development means that every device in a Z-Wave system from sensors to locks will reside in a secure ecosystem.

UL’s 1023 approval of the Z-Wave wireless mesh protocol allows the technology to be incorporated into professional-grade UL-rated alarm sensors.

This earlier ratification of Z-Wave by UL was important because the market feared Z-Wave was hackable and that once a device had been breached it would give an attacker ready access to an entire Z-Wave security and automation mesh. The threat was revealed when U.S. Black Hats intercepted a Z-Wave

transmission and impersonated a device a few year’s ago. Adding anti-jamming and AES encryption to Z-Wave has taken its intrinsic security to an even higher level.

A key consideration is what this rapid Z-Wave development in secure comms means for the alarm systems of the future, especially coupled with security fears surrounding networked devices. Proper UL security sensors running on Z-Wave don’t need to work with traditional solid state alarm panels with Z-Wave bolted on. Instead they can be deployed around any one of dozens of controllers which variously support Zigbee, Wi-Fi, Z-Wave and Bluetooth and are addressed by a comprehensive mobile app. The integration of a security requirement is a statement of intent from Z-Wave and its 350 licensed manufacturers. n

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● Special report

Cyber security

BY s i m o n p o l l a k

What would the impact to your organisation be if someone hacked into your systems, accessed client lists and alarm codes then proceeded to carry out a series of break and enters?

Physical Security Why IT matters The security industry is generally quite mature with regards to risk management and mitigation, yet there is a perception that IT security and physical security are unrelated domains, with attitudes often being either that anything being connected is bad or that IT security is an IT problem.

ORE years ago than I care to admit (and definitely beyond the statute of limitations) I was working on the access control system at a correctional facility. Happily minding my own business, I was approached by an inmate of considerable size who enquired if I was working on the security system. After confirming that this was indeed the case, he suggested that he had some friends who would be VERY interested in getting hold of addresses and alarm codes, and in return, I’d get a 30 per cent cut of any proceeds.

Frantically looking around for a corrections officer and trying to look calm, I managed to introduce myself giving someone else’s name and suggested that we should talk once he got out. While we may not think about it, all security organisations have information on their systems that would be

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immensely valuable in the wrong hands and it’s possible we’re not all doing as much as we should to protect it.

If we consider information security through the risk management process that we are well familiar with, the first step is to identify our valuable or business-critical assets. Some of the areas that are particularly specific to the security industry include: l Site details such as names, addresses, alarm codes, rosters, site orders, and stand down passwords – all very useful if someone want to break into a site l For technical security providers and consultants; as-built drawings and design documents detailing all the security technology at a particular site l Lists of master and installer codes and passwords l Upload / download software which would allow the exfiltration of codes or the addition of back door credentials. l Client and employee information l Contracts, tender documents, and other commercially sensitive information.

There are people for whom all of this information would be valuable, and while this list may be a little

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● Special report

Cyber security

the rapid acceleration of cybercrime has presented all of us with additional threats that we must ensure we have the capability to manage

criminal-centric, there is also a lot of information that would deliver commercial advantage. While never officially confirmed, it is alleged that the plans for the ASIO Headquarters, including communications schematics and server room locations, were stolen from the computer systems of a building contractor involved in the project after it was hacked by the Chinese government. If these claims are indeed true, it would have made for a very bad day for the company that got hacked.

There not all that much new and unique about doing a risk assessment so I’m not going to look at every step in painful detail as it’s a methodology most security professionals are very familiar with. Consider the threat actors who may wish to do harm to your organisation, or compromise these assets. While the threat actors are listed in many different ways, they can be broken down into a few specific groups against whom you may need to defend your systems: l Criminal Organisations: This can include ransomware attacks, individuals or groups who want to access your information for criminal gain, or who want to use your IT infrastructure for bot nets or other “free” computing resources. l State Sponsored Hackers: If you are working on projects for government, military, or law enforcement, your systems could certainly be a target. l Trusted Insiders: While sometimes tarred with the same brush, I find it handy to break this down into two sub-sets. The first is the malicious insider – the employee who goes into competition and takes a copy of your client files, or the ex-contractor who wants to do malicious damage to your systems.

The second is the unwitting (some may say foolish) insider – the person who opens a malware laden email attachment, or downloads freeware from the web and accidentally infects your IT systems. l Issues Motivated Individuals & Groups: While hacktivists are a less common threat in the security industry, there are certainly groups who take exception to the activities of some security organisations, and those who wish to do harm to the clients we are tasked with protecting.

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Simon Pollak is a security professional with more than 25 years’ experience in physical and cyber security, smart buildings and automation systems. A licensed security consultant, he holds a Masters of Cyber Security and a Masters of Business Administration (Technology) and writes a monthly article in SEN discussing all things cyber security.

What would the impact to your organisation be if someone hacked into your systems, accessed client lists and alarm codes then proceeded to carry out a series of break and enters? Would your organisation be able to recover from the reputational damage, let alone any possible lawsuits? There is an increasing focus in larger businesses on the cyber security controls of their 3rd party providers and having robust certified cyber security controls in place will become more and more of a basic requirement when providing B2B services.

Once you have a view of your valuable data and those you may want to protect it from, you’re best to work with a cyber security professional to assess, and if necessary, improve your controls. Modern IT environments are highly complex and variable so any solution should be tailored to suit your specific requirements. Find a provider which understands risk management and with whose proposed solution addresses your business risks.

As well as protecting the information stored on your systems, what about a compromise on the availability of your systems? Email has been the ubiquitous form of business communication for some time now. If your clients emailed you with a service request and didn’t get a timely response, would they consider other providers? What if your service and booking system was taken offline for a few days?

Another form of fraud that has become quite popular of late is invoice fraud. One of the common ways this takes place is that a criminal raises invoices for services not rendered then has an inside accomplice approve the invoices for payment. Alternatively, a criminal determines a regular supplier then convinces an organisation to update said supplier’s bank account details to those of the criminal. By the time anyone realises the money has gone to the fraudulent account, the funds are long gone.

I was recently discussing this over coffee with the owner of a large guarding provider and asked him “if I found the name of one of your guards on LinkedIn then sent email to HR@yoursecuritycompany.com.au asking to update my bank account details, would your office just process it?” After some consideration, he agreed that it would more than likely just get done, even a few requests in a pay cycle would not be uncommon. How would a similar event sit with your organisations risk appetite – a loss of maybe $5k - $10k, some unhappy staff, and maybe a little reputational damage? In all likelihood such an incident wouldn’t have a major impact, but if you can mitigate it through a simple validation process, is it worth doing so?

While physical security risks have not diminished - and depending on the domains in which we operate they have potentially increased - the rapid acceleration of cybercrime has presented all of us with additional threats that we must ensure we have the capability to manage. Assessing and mitigating risk is something the physical security industry is well familiar with – it’s time we started to apply those skills to our information assets, too. n

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● Special feature

Integration

Integrated Solutions The catchcry of the moment is devilishly hard to pin down but while a definition of integrated solutions may be opaque, there’s no question whatever that for end users centralisation of operational functionality has a powerful resonance.

John Adams spoke with Inner Ranges’ Vin Lopes to discover more.

Q: How would you define the term ‘integrated solution’?

A: From our experience people use this terminology quite generally to describe a myriad of differing solutions for a variety of applications.

Sometimes 2 or more functions are integrated in the one product, such as security and access control in our Integriti system, while at other times the term is used to describe the exchange of information between systems that are built primarily to perform standalone tasks.

It is also used when one system is tasked as the

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PSIM (Physical Security Information Management) to provide overall control of several disparate systems performing various tasks in the solution.

There are even more variations, as in the case of our Integriti software, which has been enhanced with so many 3rd party integrations such that in some instances it has become the primary user interface for many applications beyond security and access control, including telephony, paging, SCADA, CCTV, elevators and electric fencing.

However, if we were to give a general definition, we would say “where products from more than one manufacturer are intelligently connected to provide a desired set of functionality.”

Q: What do you put this evolution of system integration down to? What is driving it?

A: From where we sit probably the strongest drivers for the evolution of system integration are firstly the human instinctive desire for a simple answer to complex problems and secondly a tech-obsessed world demanding more and more from its devices.

Consultants seeking to be relevant load their specs with wish lists. Companies trying to differentiate their offerings produce tempting variants which hold out the promise (real or imagined) of a better

solution and clients trying to future proof their purchases look for the latest technologies.

Quite often a real problem is actually solved by a well-designed integration in a way that nothing else could have done, so the philosophy of integration is a wonderful and powerful solution, but like many other noble causes in life it is often hijacked by people with agendas that distort its real potential.

Q: Many solutions integrate but what do you think defines the perfect integrated system?

A: From our perspective a perfect integration is one where all the end goals are thoroughly identified and analysed before the solution is chosen or designed. A system where the client’s expectations are properly understood and the solution offered is realistic in the light of the technology deployed and the budget available for the system. Once all of this is on the table it is a system that delivers the outcomes everyone was looking for at the beginning of the process.

Q: How important is integration in terms of its ability to offer large site and enterprise end users situational awareness of all parts of their operations in real time? Is such a thing possible with today’s technology and are user’s seeking these sorts of solutions?

A: It is very important and it is ultimately the only philosophy that can actually deliver situational awareness of all parts of a client’s operations in real-time. Given that no single company has the expertise in every technical discipline, bringing together best of breed components into a single integrated solution is the only answer.

Such a thing is definitely possible with today’s technology, and users are seeking these solutions in ever increasing numbers. At Inner Range we enjoy the experience of delivering successful integrated solutions to satisfied customers all over the world. However, this is not without its considerable challenges.

Q: Do you think we have reached a point where proprietary and open software and hardware components allow installers and integrators to build the systems they want to build or are there still restrictions? What are those restrictions?

A: I think it’s fair to say that in the current market there are many products that will allow installers and integrators to build the systems they want, providing the products they specify are well supported in terms of collaboration between the manufacturers of each product.

However, there are several factors which come together to frustrate the delivery of a perfect integrated system.

There can be poor identification of the client’s needs. The term integration is often used without

From our perspective a perfect integration is one where all the end goals are thoroughly identified and analysed before the solution is chosen or designed. any indication of what performance is expected or the tangible benefits to the end user in the final integrated system.

Vested interests are something else to consider.

There are many strategic alliances between manufacturers, distributers, integrators and consultants. Where a proposed integration results in a conflict of interest, measures are sometimes taken by manufacturers to limit interoperability for commercial interests.

Of course, successful delivery of an integrated system requires a much greater level of technical knowledge than working with a single system.

System integrators are now increasingly finding themselves working in the IT domain, where there is still a notable skills shortage in the security industry.

There can also be structural incompatibility between systems. In such cases, products from different vendors may be developed based on differing industry protocols or platforms and may not integrate well or at all. Although there is a push towards standardisation within the industry there is equally a tendency for manufacturers to use proprietary extensions to differentiate their products.

Version skew is another issue to keep an eye on. Over the lifetime of an integrated system, each component of the system may be upgraded as manufacturers release new features and bug-fixes.

This can result in incompatibility between systems if software interfaces change between versions.

And finally, there are budgetary constraints. The costs involved in developing seamless integrations between disparate systems in a climate of everchanging protocols and interfacing standards are extremely high, with a relatively low potential for widespread code reuse across projects. As such, the benefits of a highly integrated system must be weighed against the costs of both development, maintenance and support over the lifetime of the system. These are just a few of the potential pitfalls - there are many others.

In the current market, successful delivery of integrated solutions requires judicious selection of subsystem components which adhere to the strategic alliances and complementary architectures between vendors. Well tested and proven integrations will always yield better results than attempting to join two fundamentally incompatible systems together with the IT equivalent of duct tape. n

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● New product

Video analytics

Addicted to SaaS Harnessing the functionality of MOBOTIX cameras, Addictive Technology Solutions has developed what it describes as a ground-breaking cloud-based retail business intelligence solution.

HAT if you could offer your customers a sophisticated retail business intelligence solution, at a competitive price, branded as your own, with the simple click of a mouse?” asks Rob Marsden of Addictive Technology Solutions.

“What if the solution came already configured, with ongoing maintenance and a guaranteed regular income for your business? IP security cameras are renowned for their exceptional image quality and decentralized technology. All image processing and analysis is carried out within the camera itself, so no servers are required and network load is kept to an absolute minimum. This makes installation easy and economical. Furthermore, thanks to intelligent hemispheric technology, fewer cameras are required and providing even more value for money.”

According to Marsden, MOBOTIX hemispheric camera models C25, Q25, P25, I25, M25, S15M come with MxAnalytics as standard.

“This statistical behaviour analysis software allows the counting of objects within predefined corridors, with the most frequented areas highlighted on a heat map,” he sayes. “Addictive Technology Solutions has combined this with other

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We have combined this with other data relating to the recorded events, to create a powerful customer insight and intelligence reporting platform in the cloud.

data relating to the recorded events, to create a powerful customer insight and intelligence reporting platform in the cloud.”

According to Marsden, the following features are available: l People Counting – How many people pass through an area, or enter and leave a store lHeat maps – The number of people per hour in a certain area, plus the hottest and coldest parts of your store lPoint of Sale Integration – Integrates with most modern POS systems to cross-reference data, and analyse trends and spending patterns lAlerts and notifications – Unexpected behaviour or overcrowding in certain areas of the store lWeather analysis – track and analyse consumer behaviour against internal ambient temperatures and external weather conditions.

“This retail business intelligence solution, the first of many innovative products to be launched by Addictive Technology Solutions, will be available to purchase as SaaS (Software as a Service) at a reduced monthly price,” says Marsden.

“It makes a perfect value-add to MOBOTIX camera installations, and can be charged to customers at a monthly fee, providing a recurring income opportunity for integrators. What really makes this product stand out though, is the white-labelling, allowing business owners to brand and market as their own.”

Addictive Technology Solutions is a specialist in the fields of IT, networking and electronic security and the company has a particular focus on software as a services applications. The company’s IT nous, as well as its operational electronic security focus, give Addictive considerable strengths in the SaaS market by blending the latest networking technology with timeless security challenges.

But the key for intergrators is the ability of SaaS solutions like the analytics developed by Addictive to shake out ROI – video surveillance can now be valued not just from the point of view of security and safety but as a business solution. Lateral applications allow better management of people movement, air conditioning systems, PoS-based trends, custom alerts and external inputs like weather analysis.

Being cloud-based, there’s no need to purchase and commission expensive items of network hardware – image streams are analysed in the cloud with reports, alerts and notifications sent to authorised recipients. n

● Special report

Products 2016

best products of 2016

What were the best and most innovative products of 2016? And where do they suggest the electronic security industry is heading over the next 12 months? Are we pushing ahead when it comes to technology or are market forces giving users and installers easier access to the functionalities of lower quality hardware?

AKING calls about the best products over a 12-month period is tough. You’re pretty much guaranteed to get plenty wrong.

There are products you overlook and products you never saw. But there’s no doubt it is possible to get a strong sense of the market as well as a feel for the direction the best solutions are likely to take into the future.

In 2016 the cost consciousness of end users started to show up more clearly – particularly in the surveillance market, where there’s now a whole segment that does the best it can with the least it can, all this in the name of affordability.

Regular readers know what we think of low cost surveillance cameras, so I won’t go through a big re-run here. Suffice to say, when it comes to CCTV cameras end users should pay close attention to operational requirements as they make their choices. Saving money by installing cameras that don’t do the job creates an internal paradox from which there is no operational escape.

Trends in CCTV in 2016 included the increasing maturity in the high end bullet camera market, with products like the Bosch 5000 IP and Samsung’s

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SNO-8081R bullet. The SNO has with 1/1.8-inch 6MP CMOS sensors, and a 3.6-9.4mm motorized vari-focal lens with auto-focus. Canon’s VBH761LVE was another standout. It’s a weather and impact-resistant infrared bullet camera with a sensitive 1/3-inch Full HD CMOS sensor, fast auto focusing, 20x optical zoom lens, 60m infrared range and multiple built-in analytics. There’s also the IPC-HFW8331E-Z from Dahua and the Uniview 22x optical Starlight, among others. Not having tested them all, I couldn’t say which was best overall but I think the screamingly fast Bosch remote zoom and focus in the 5000 bullet is the best we’ve ever seen.

Still in CCTV, panoramic cameras made advances this year. There are still compromises, however. Even an 8MP sensor is going to look soft when covering a 360-degree angle of view.

Mobotix has long been master of this domain but Panasonic’s new 360 looks good too, and offerings from Sony, Hikvision, Bosch and Vivotek are also making a mark. We saw the release of the Immervision-powered IPC-EBW8600 from Dahua, Geutebruck released the IK10 360-degree G-Cam EHC 3285, Uniview released a new fisheye with 12MP of resolution, as well as IR, IK10 and IP66 ratings. When it comes to these panoramic cameras, be sure that you only need faces and plates closer up and can make do with variable situational awareness further out dependent on good light. Keep an eye on WDR performance (avoid blooming), huge barrel distortions and unusually flat and wide de-warps.

The proliferation of multi-head cameras in 2016 is a statement about the challenges of wide angle views using single hi-res sensors and fisheye type lenses, as well as an acknowledgement by the market that it would really like high quality 180-degree views with strong depths of field.

When it comes to the best of the bunch this year, you’d be looking at Vivotek, Pelco and Axis. Or would you? At Security 2016 we saw Hikvision’s extremely powerful PanoVu DP1636Z-D, which incorporates multiple Darkfighter cameras in a panoramic array with an integrated PTZ. Together with clever software, PanoVu captures panoramic images as well as close-up images, while advanced video analysis and a multiple target tracking algorithm incorporated.

At the same time, Dahua rolled out the DH-IPCPFW8601, a multi-head camera that can provide a 180-degree panoramic flat view without edge distortion, along with a digital PTZ function. This camera employs Sony starlight image technology for low light performance. The camera features H.265 encoding and highly intelligent features such as people counting and heat mapping.

Something else that has been going on in CCTV this year is the resurgence of digital analogue.

Many companies now have tidy little ranges of very affordable high resolution analogue that are loved by installers not only for low cost and

BY J O H N A D A M S

an ability to leverage existing cabling and skill-sets.

According to techs, they like the low latency, low noise, strong low light performance and excellent handling of motion blur they get from analogue digital cameras. Hikvision’s HDTVI 3.0 solution is a case in point. It delivers up to 5 MP-resolution with a 4K video output. It has H.264+ compression and delivers high-quality HD720p at 1200m and 1080p at 800m over coaxial cable.

Alongside the resurgence of analogue runs DVR/ NVR development offering support for multiple camera technologies – these include the so-called tribrid recorders from manufacturers like Dahua.

Speaking of recorders, there were some seriously big recorders released this year, including Hikvision’s BlazerPro, with support for 128 or 256 IP cameras to a maximum bandwidth of 400Mbps. At this input level, and as long as the global bandwidth is sufficient, recorders like BlazerPro can handle quite large applications. Its integrated VMS features sophisticated alarm management, license plate recognition, POS integration, business intelligence, and GIS maps as standard options.

In CCTV, we’ve seen spill-over from the consumer market for years and the iCS lens from Axis, which allows complete elimination of barrel distortions at the wide angle of 2.8mm is an example of the way this is continuing. Axis obviously isn’t the only maker with distortion correction in-camera but the system works well and given the wide angles we are seeing, it’s likely this sort of technology will be become more prevalent. Axis also released a 20MP camera with a Canon sensor that’s compatible with Canon’s DSLR lens range.

Compression continues to be a key area of development, with H.265 (HVEC) coming to the fore in 2016. A number of companies are working with this technology – probably Vivotek’s offering, which we saw closely at SecTech in May, was most impressive. Even at very high resolutions, H.265 kept data streams well in check. This is important, because while other systems work well, too, they work best when there is little or no movement in a scene. Very busy scenes or longer focal lengths don’t benefit as much.

What’s important when it comes to enhanced compression is the fact so many companies are including it in their solutions – Dahua, Samsung, Hikvision, Axis (which released Zipstream II and Zipstream for PTZs) and Vivotek, as well as Panasonic with its Smart Coding spring to mind.

And VMS developers are ensuring their solutions are supportive.

Highly specified PTZ domes were another standout this year. There was Hikvision’s 4K PTZ, which really knocked our socks off during a demo at the Hikvision office. Uniview’s Starlight PTZ dome with 2MP of resolution (1080p), 44x optical zoom and 250 metres of IR range is another great release.

There was a strong new IR PTZ from Vivotek, Panasonic released the AeroPTZ, Dahua released new PTZs, as did Axis with Q61, as did Pelco and

Bosch. Vivotek’s SD9364-EHL has an impressive spec, with 1080p full HD resolution to go with its H.265, 150m IR illuminators, VAIR, WDR, and 30x optical zoom, IP66 and NEMA 4X-rated housing and a decently wide operating temperature range between -50 and 55C. As you can sense with this Vivotek, what’s great about all the latest PTZs is that they have great specifications and they’re more affordable than ever before. Not every camera in an application needs to be a PTZ but almost every application would benefit from including some.

We saw Sony’s SNC-VB770 full body camera for the first time this year. It’s a strong performer, offering 4K and the highest low light sensitivity in its class - under 0.004 lux with an ISO rating of 409600. At SecTech

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● Special report

Products 2016

in Sydney it came very close to seeing in the dark, while controlling noise as well as you could possibly expect it to. Most manufacturers have starlight models of varying capabilities. In terms of dedicated CCTV cameras the 4K SNC-VB770 is the best, though it comes at a price.

What about thermal? It came off the boil a little in 2016 – of the cameras we saw, we liked Dahua’s dual thermal optical PTZ with 40x zoom. Mobotix’ ability to leverage thermal with MxAnalytics was also notewothy. Speaking more broadly of thermal, Bosch released the AVIOTEC IP starlight 8000, a CCTV camera that incorporates a video-based fire detection system that spots fires and disturbances, predicts behaviour to reduce false alarms and speeds reaction time – helping security managers react to threats proactively. Nice one.

Another area of growth in 2016 was body-worn cameras. The Edesix VideoBadge is a user-friendly, robust and secure BWC, often styled as an ID card holder. These BWCs are capable of efficiently recording shift-long HD video and audio footage from the viewpoint of the operator. Together with custom developed VideoManager software for handling, editing and sharing BWC footage, VideoBadges provide users with an advanced, easyto-use solution for gathering and readying evidence of recorded incidents. Then there’s FrontLine 2, IndigoVision’s second generation body worn video camera, which ensures every incident is seen, heard and recorded thanks to its 28-hour, encrypted on-

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board recording, 130-degree lens, HD video and high fidelity audio. Genetec’s Clearance solution leverages the capability of such cameras, as well as any other source of video that contributes to investigations.

Management software rolls on, though it’s getting harder to describe the latest solutions as VMS. This is now the coal face of integration. Pelco’s VideoExpert includes analytics, license plate recognition, POS integration and alarm and event management.

Sektor’s very clever Harmony Transaction Player contrives to integrate with multiple manufacturers systems to offer access to CCTV that links to PoS, stock control, warehousing and more. Meanwhile, Genetec’s Security Centre, which scales from very capable to all powerful, is certainly more than a VMS and Genetec’s Mission Control takes this to a whole new level by wrangling Security Center’s capabilities into shapes that offer the best operational response to unfolding incidents. There’s mapping and graphics integrating video feeds, event reporting, incident management, procedures and operator response workflow and auditing.

Another strong release in 2016 was Tyco Total Security, a solution which includes access control, IP video surveillance and intrusion detection.

Available via a unified graphical user interface (GUI), Total Security allows users to manage multiple security tasks on any Internet-connected device. With real-time alerts, remote arm/disarm capabilities, access management and live video look-in, Total Security provides new ways to help improve workplace safety, security and business operations.

Aimetis Symphony 7 is another VMS that manages cameras locally or on mobile devices, has alarm notification and log, linked site map and event-driven timeline. It’s particularly strong in analytics, with motion tracking, object classification, people and vehicle counting, automatic license

plate recognition, virtual fence, loitering and dwell time and auto-PTZ tracking. And the NX Witness VMS uses an HTTP Generic Event API and VCA’s burn-in analytics so users can quickly integrate video analytics that are viewable on both live and recorded video displayed in the NX Witness client.

Still in software, I liked Axis Site Designer, which helps system integrators and installers with an intuitive and efficient new web application that reduces the time and effort needed to design complete security solutions. Avigilon’s Appearance Search was another winner. Appearance Search allows you to run a search of all video inputs for a particular individual, and have the system display in thumbnails all the closest possible matches that an operator then elevates to the top of the display by tagging. If you want to watch the footage, click on the tile.

Access control has continued to evolve in 2016 – it’s obviously been going on at the top end for a long time but now we are seeing a serious impact in the affordable end of the market. In this area of the market are Inner Range Inception, ICT Protege WX, Paxton net2 and net10, Bosch G Series controller. CS Technologies also continues to develop its capable Evo system. Something I saw this year for the first time was Dahua’s DHI ASC 1204B, which will handle 100,000 cards and 300,000 records.

Addressing the same market in a different way is Tyco’s Kantech EntraPass Security Software V7.0, a suite of high performance software that allows customers to design and operate any number of doors where card access is required - securely, quickly and efficiently. It has Aperio wireless locks integration and also supports integration with Exacq video management systems, American Dynamics DVRs/NVRs, Kantech INTEVO integrated security platform and DSC PowerSeries control panels.

In alarms in 2016, I liked the Sensormat detection solution, which employs a network of fibre optics

embedded in a robust industrial mat and generates exquisitely detailed detection signals. Also new in alarms this year was the Bosch B Series B4512 intrusion control panels, which offers 28 zones and 22 areas. Resolution Systems’ Helix system has 96 wireless zones and you can select from standard door or window movement sensors, Nanomax movement sensors, PIR pet immune sensors, tilt sensors, PIR gimbal sensors, glassbreaks and wireless sirens. There’s a Helipad Bluetooth Smart RF connection between keypad and control panel with a capacitive touchscreen and the system can also be controlled using keyfobs or panic pendants.

We met FSH’s SCEC-approved SL4 FSS1 Door Monitoring Sensor in 2016. It replaces traditional reed switch technology with a microprocessor, a smart combination of Hall Effect sensors and a magnetic array plate, allowing the unit to be recalibrated in case of door drop. Neat, too, the FSH sensor is available in flush or surface mount. In the alarms and automation space, Panasonic’s wireless intercoms are nice work, too. Video doorbells are another area to watch.

What are the over-arching trends? Cost consciousness, ever more intuitive management and installation, integration driven by management solutions, the IT security of electronic security, a continuing push to attain recurring revenue through the cloud from hardware manufacturers and software developers.

There’s also the tacit acknowledgement in parts of the CCTV market that optical quality is what’s going to drive lateral expansion of the surveillance business – an expansion fuelled by video analytics.

Clearly, there’s a lot of value in a video stream – such a data stream can be filtered for all sorts of useful statistics that contribute to safety, security, marketing, process control and almost anything else you can build a measurable threshold for.

When you’re leveraging a data stream for so much vital information, it makes sense to ensure it’s a quality data stream. n

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● Regulars

Products

Editor’s choice Uniview 2MP/4MP Cameras With H.265 & U-code l UNIVIEW has released 2MP H.265 + U-code series IP camera range, including mini bullet, vandal-proof fixed dome and turret fixed dome. This new series is high performance, based on Hisilicon H.265 chipset, supports U-code smart compression and 4 basic smart functions.

H.265, (High Efficiency Video Coding) can reduce up to 50 per cent bandwidth but keep high image quality. U-code is an optimized deep compression technology released by Uniview, which can reduce up to 95 per cent bandwidth and no details are missed.

U-code uses IRP (Intelligent Region Perception) to detect motion in each frame so that scenes containing interesting information could be preserved while the other relatively static area such as lawns, white walls could be squeezed to save storage. The 4 smart functions in H.265 IP camera series are face detection, intrusion, crossing line, and people counting.

Line crossing and intrusion will detect behaviours which break configured rules, while face detection will detect faces that appear in configured area. When objects are detected, IP cameras will trigger optional alarms of email, alarm output, storage, snapshot, or ftp upload.

Distributor: C.R. Kennedy Contact: +61 3 9823 1555

IndigoVision BX camera Upgrade l INDIGOVISION BX PTZ is now available in 4MP with a new

injection of features. Users will benefit from improved analytics, increased frame rate and the addition of POE+ powered heaters for cold climates, as well as now being able to see further with increased 30x optical zoom. The camera is also available in both in-ceiling and environmental pendant form factors.

Greater visibility during twilight hours is now possible with the HD fixed camera thanks to improved WDR and new low light sensors.

Added improvements include analytics, increased frame rate and the flexibility provided by CS mount lenses in both the standard and telephoto options. Installation and maintenance is simplified with auto back focus which provides fine adjustment of focus from the camera’s web page.

Distributor: Indigovision – Integrated Products Contact: 1300 055 164

What’s new in the industry.

VIVOTEK Adds New Multiple-Sensor Vandal Dome, MS8392-EV with Aesthetic Design l VIVOTEK has added the MS8392-EV vandal dome to its multiple-sensor product line. The MS8392-EV has four 3-megapixel CMOS sensors offering 180-degree panoramic views and a new design. Specially equipped with a video alignment feature, the MS8392-EV allows users to optimize the image quality of each sensor and experience both natural and optimal continuous panoramic views. It is also equipped with a removable IR-cut filter and WDR-enhanced technology to deliver day-and-night protection and extend image visibility under high-contrast lighting conditions.

There’s an IK10 and IP66-rated housing and a -50C to 50C temperature range meaning the MS8392-EV is able to withstand rain and dust and is safeguarded against vandalism and tampering when deployed for outdoor surveillance. To eliminate interference caused by direct sunlight, the camera includes a sunshield for wall mount applications, and users are free to choose either corner mount or pole mount accessories to achieve easy installation whatever the application.

Distributor: Hills Contact: 1800 685 487

HID from Electronic Development Sales l HID Global’s iCLASS SE access control platform enables customers to future-proof their access control infrastructures while simplifying how identities are created, used and managed, across a broad continuum of application requirements using any combination of smart cards, microprocessor cards and NFCenabled smartphones. iClass SE readers are based on HID Global’s Secure Identity Object (SIO), a portable credential methodology and its Trusted Identity Platform (TIP) for advanced applications, mobility and heightened security. iCLASS SE® 13.56 MHz contactless smart card technology enables a new class of portable identity credentials that can be securely provisioned and safely embedded into both fixed and mobile devices. The readers support the everexpanding universe of multiple credential technologies for seamless migration and are field programmable for secure upgrades and extended lifecycle.

Distributor: Electronic Development Sales Contact:+61 2 9496 0500

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ExSite Enhanced Explosion-Proof Camera - Coming Spring 2017!

Dahua Technology Shipping 4MP HD Analogue

l FROM the relentless sub-zero temperatures of Arctic oil pipelines, to the scorching heat of desert drill sites, to the high wind and corrosive elements of ports and offshore rigs, Pelco by Schneider Electric has engineered a camera line robust enough to operate in the most hazardous environments imaginable. Pelco’s ExSite Enhanced Explosion-Proof cameras are ideally suited for critical infrastructure environments, such as petrochemical, marine, port and hazardous materials plants and locations. Pelco is a trusted partner where reliability and robustness are crucial to protect people and assets.

l DAHUA is shipping a next-generation analogue HD solution, including two 4MP cameras and a 4MP DVR with 4, 8 and 16-channel options, to bring outstanding image quality to outdated analogue coax cabling.

Available in both bullet and eyeball housing, the versatile yet powerful HDCVI 3.0 cameras offer high performance, reliability, and overall ease of use. The cameras are embedded with an IR cut filter for various lighting conditions and industry-leading wide dynamic range (WDR) technology (120dB). This allows important details to easily be captured in scenes with both bright and dark areas, providing excellent images at any time of day.

Also available is a companion 4MP tribrid DVR featuring seamless video recording from HDCVI, CVBS, and IP sources simultaneously. The Dahua HDCVI 3.0 DVR offers Smart H.264+ codec dual-stream video compression to save up to 70 per cent on bandwidth and storage compared to standard H.264.

Distributor: Pelco By Schneider Electric Contact: +61 2 9125 8094

Distributor: Seadan Security & Electronics Contact: 1300 366 851

Hikvision adds IP Intercoms

Integriti Prisma-SIFER Keypad

l HIKVISION has added IP Intercoms to its portfolio to cater for

l INTEGRITI Prisma-SIFER keypad features an inbuilt multiformat SIFER reader capable of reading all SIFER credentials or the card serial number (CSN) from other 13.56Mhz credentials.

The inbuilt SIFER reader can be used for the following functions; card access control, card and PIN access control, card login, card and PIN login. The Integriti Prisma keypad provides a stylish and simple keypad to control the Integriti system. Featuring a full colour LCD screen, and a simple to use icon, function key and scroll wheel navigation system, the Prisma keypad provides a delightful user experience. End users can perform simple functions such as arming and disarming areas, isolating zones, and reviewing event history all accessible via the full colour graphic display.

the domestic and commercial markets. The solution can handle up to 512 touch screen room stations and 9 digital apartment door stations, answering the most demanding installations. Hikvision offers adaptive 10/100 switches with power over network cables for a quick and easy installation or they can seamlessly integrate into a customer’s existing LAN. There’s a range of classy 7-inch colour room stations, from the inexpensive DS-KH6210-L with push buttons to the touch screen DS-KH8301-WT. The touch screen room station incorporates room to room video call capability and on board Wi-Fi supporting the Hikvision Smart Phone App. There is also a full complement of accessories such as concierge stations, card despatchers and IP lift relays. Integration has been completed with an Integriti HLI for a complete integrated Intercom / access solution.

Distributor: Central Security Distribution Contact: 1300 319 499

Distributor: Central Security Distribution Contact: 1300 319 499

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● Regulars

Help desk ■ Below are the approximate recommendations for rest times (complete rest, that is) between sets according to your goal, per the National Streng th and Conditioning Association (NSCA). *Note that since fat loss depends primarily on diet, there is no official rest-period prescription for it, although we feel that both short and long rests work, depending on the program.

Q: We are setting up a Synology DS415+ NAS for a client who intends to use it for both network storage and as the management system for 2 and later 5 IP cameras. We were considering mirroring but storage will be too limited. Our question relates to what SEN considers to be the best way to configure the disk group in storage manager and why is this way best?

A: We’d be thinking about setting up the 4 disks as RAID (redundant array of independent disks), most particularly, we’d be using a RAID 5 configuration. Briefly, RAID stores data using striping on multiple HDDs combined into a single storage unit.

Essentially striping an array of drives involves partitioning each drive’s platter into storage stripes of any size from half a kilobyte to a few megabytes.

Storage stripes are interleaved across the array so that the entire storage solution is made up of many different data stripes from all the drives woven together. Data saves or searches see the disks shuffled like a deck of cards during download and retrieval. In video surveillance applications, RAID allows the use of small stripes around 512-bytes long so that images are recorded across every disk in the array with each drive storing a part of the image stream.

There are 2 advantages here. Firstly, loss of a hard drive doesn’t mean complete loss of data - the other disks in the array can rebuild the

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Our panel of experts answers your questions.

files lost from a failed HDD. And secondly, record accesses can be performed very quickly – that’s perfect for video applications. RAID-5 works in the same way as RAID-4 but unlike RAID-3 it shares parity across all the disks, meaning there’s no single-disk bottleneck. RAID-5 allows smaller writes to be undertaken faster than RAID-4 and while read performance is not as good as RAID-4, RAID-5’s ability to handle single disk failure with no data loss means it is the answer where fast reads are not the ultimate goal. As a side note, using 7200rpm HDDs will mitigate much of the read latency of RAID-5 arrays with slower rates of spin.

Q: I have a 16-input NVR in a site comprising a system in which there are 3 cameras with Cat-5e cables connected to the recorder and everything has been working fine.

However, if I use a longer cable to more cameras then plug into the recorder they do not work and yet if you plug the same camera into a short lead all works fine. Cameras are all IP units with IR for night view. I have also made up a Cat-6e cable to use which allows the data led on recorder to work better but still does not quite make a view. In order to resolve the issue, I purchased an 8-way POE injector and wired that to the NVR in Cat-6e, then plugged in the cameras and surprise, they all worked, which means this NVR is only good for 3 IR IP cameras before the power supply dies and not grunty

enough to run any further cameras.

What does SEN think?

A: This does sound like a power problem.

You’ve not said how long the cable runs are but we can assume they are within the expected range. The NVR you mention (but we don’t) maxes out at 200W total draw with 4 HDDs, while 16 PoE cameras pulling 13W per input would draw about 210W. It’s an interesting dilemma that seems to require installers pay attention to camera current draw. PoE is typically around 13W per channel with a 15W maximum, which most NVRs should have no trouble delivering to every input. Meanwhile, PoE+ delivers 25W in typical applications with a maximum of 34W. That unit you mention has an integrated 8-port PoE switch and you’d think this would deliver a full 8 cameras – IR domes for instance - without too much drama. A typical IR dome will have a maximum draw of about 10W but will ordinarily only use half this.

Q: SEN has been critical of low cost compact dome cameras in recent times – perhaps as the price war heats up – would you say an affordable camera such as the Axis 3045 LV – and its competitors from all the other brands, including Hikvision, Dahua, Panasonic, Bosch, Samsung, etc, is not suited to some security applications and installers should use something else?

A: After receiving this question I re-read the review we ran on the Axis M3045 LV recently. We liked this camera when we

looked at it – it’s compact and affordable but does most the important things very well. I don’t think you can compare the M3045 to some of the very low cost compact domes we’ve seen. It’s better than they are and Zipstream is the cherry on top. The M3045 is an affordable fixed 1080p compact dome with a 2.8mm focal length giving a very large 106-degree angle of view and typical barrel distortion of around 10 per cent.

Chromatic aberrations and lens flare are very low. There are certainly applications we would not choose the M3045 – staying with the same brand, we’d probably look at the Axis P3325 instead. But there are also applications we would consider the M3045 and its competitors from the manufacturers you mention. With 1080p and wide fixed focal length you are looking at court admissible faces in good light out to 12m – that comes in towards 8m in 7 lux.

In lights levels of less than 7 lux at the lens things are going to get noisy and there will be motion blur.

I would specify the M3045 in internal applications, with maximum facial ID at 10m and a useful depth of field in good light out to at least 30m. You’d want artificial illumination after hours – adjacent IR or reduced house lighting. You could use low cost LED lights in compact spaces. This camera is surprisingly good with backlight, the closer to the entry, the better it performs. For typical store applications, it’s a winner. However, if you need face recognition past 8m in 7 lux or lower, then you’d need to look elsewhere. Same applies if you want to install the camera under cover but hope for incidental licence plates on the street. At typical street speeds, we did not get plates in good light but not every application needs them.

Pedestrians move much more slowly.

Compact cameras are built to a price – we saw this very clearly recently at the

Scentre Group Shootout in the compact camera category. Throw low light, WDR or rapid movement at right angles and things get a bit iffy. Objective testing will provide you with the answers.

Q: I’ve had a request from one of our customers for a replacement video encoder which seems to have been damaged by water. The unit is a Siqura S-60E SA and the installation was completed back in 2009, so I’m wondering if replacement units are still available and if not, is there a compatible replacement?

A: The Siqura product range is now owned by the TKH Group and distributed in Australia by BGWT. Reach out to Graham Clark on nswsales@bgwt.com.au or 0488 169 485.

Q: Would you argue that larger sensor sizes are always superior in CCTV cameras?

A: All other things being equal, yes. Bigger is better in sensors of equal quality. But whether or not it’s worth paying for a larger sensor (and a larger diameter lens) depends on what you need the camera to do. In low light and if sensor resolution is not too high, then yes. A larger sensor will have larger pixel sizes, will absorb more light, will have better low light performance. But it’s not as simple as that, especially as better ISO performance is achieved, allowing more amplification of existing light with less noise. There are 1/3-inch 1080p cameras that have outstanding low light performance at the sorts of prices end users are prepared to pay. Something else to bear in mind is that larger sensors typically have more pixels and there’s a law of diminishing returns when it comes to cramming pixels onto sensors. For instance, with full frame sensors, some would argue best low light performance is around 15MP, despite the fact many sensors offer much higher pixel counts. It’s instructive that higher MP cameras always have much higher ISO ratings giving much greater capacity for amplification. Huge resolution is great in good light but low light performance is another thing altogether. Objective testing is the way to go. Most manufacturers are happy to allow professional end users access to a test camera in a network to allow real world comparisons to be made. n se&n 73

events

DECEMBER 2016 ISSUE 383

AFFORDABLE ACCESS CONTROL

PP 100001158

l Scentre Group CCTV Shootout l Physical Security: Why IT Matters l Best Products of 2016 l Vivotek Releases H.265 Range l Securing IP CCTV Cameras

ISC West Date: April 6-8, 2017 Venue: Sands Expo Centre, Las Vegas Contact: www.iscwest.com/Show-Info/ The International Security Conference & Exposition – also known as ISC West – is the largest event in the U.S. for the physical security industry, covering access control, alarms and monitoring, biometrics, IP security, video surveillance, networked and physical security solutions.

l Monitoring: Z-Wave Goes IoT l Genetec Plans Growing Future l Vin Lopes Talks Integration l Addictive Technology’s SaaS l Security & Government Expo

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SecTech Roadshow 2017 SECURITY & GOVERNMENT expo

Date: May 4-18, 2017 Contact: Monique Keatinge on 612 9280 4425 SecTech Roadshow takes up to 20 of Australia’s leading distributors and manufacturers on a national tour – a simple and highly targeted touring tradeshow covering 5 state capitals over 2 weeks during the month of May. In 2017, SecTech Roadshow will visit Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane.

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2017 Security Conference and Exhibition Date: July 2017 Venue: Sydney Convention and Exhibition Centre, Darling Harbour Contact: +61 3 9261 4500 Next year we’re heading back to Sydney to the brand new International Convention Centre in Darling Harbour and the anticipation is palpable! Our whole team is looking forward to reuniting the industry in sunny Sydney, we look forward to seeing you there in 2017.

SECURITY & GOVERNMENT expo

= DAILY, WEEKLY, MONTHLY.

Security and Government Expo 2017

Date: November 2017 Venue: The Realm Hotel, Canberra Contact: Monique +61 2 9280 4425 Security and Government Expo is a one-day expo with space for 20 companies to promote their technologies and products in the nation’s capital. SAGE brings together government and commercial end users, consultants, integrators and installers in Canberra and the ACT to see the latest security solutions in a relaxed and informal atmosphere.

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