IP cameras News

A lower bitrate reduces bandwidth andstorage requirements High definition and megapixel cameras provide more detailed images with more useful information, but this can come at a cost. The volume of data being transported and stored rises significantly. The bandwidth demand that this places on the network and the increase in required storage capacity adds significantly to the total IP system costs. The best place to reduce these costs is at the source – in the camera &nda...

Modern home security systems have come of age with innovative technologies that enable homeowners to have complete control over every aspect of the system. MOBOTIX’s Keith Jernigan Sr. and Hunter Fort explore the immense capabilities smart video surveillance technology to make a huge impact on the home automation systems by driving down energy costs as well as storing massive amounts of data. Home automation is not as new as most people would imagine. It has been around for several decade...

Ethernet switches are often overlooked andsometimes deemed a cheap connectivity pointwith little to no importance The Ethernet switch is a critical link between cameras, network video recorders (NVRs) and computers that need access to video feeds. The Ethernet switch not only provides the data connectivity but often the power to the IP cameras via Power over Ethernet (PoE). Ethernet switches are the fundamental backbone of a Local Area Network (LAN) and the critical connectivi...

Healthcare organisations are an important vertical market for many security manufacturers and integrators. Like other vertical markets, healthcare has its own unique set of requirements and challenges for physical security systems. We asked this week’s Expert Panel: What are the distinctive security problems faced by healthcare organisations? What technologies are being embraced to increase security?

Safer has built a reputation of notcompromising on quality for a low price,leading to increases in overseas sales in 2015 Unfazed by the number of companies following the footsteps of Hikvision and Dahua and launching their own branded product lines, one Chinese company insists on carving out its name in the manufacturing sector. Established in 2002, Shenzhen Safer Science and Technology, or Safer as the company is commonly known, acknowledges that it cannot c...

CPSE Shenzhen showcased security productsacross 11 halls. The show is arguably thelargest and most influential in Asia  China is the largest security market in the world. This makes the annual China Public Security Expo (CPSE) a force to be reckoned with and a place to be seen for every security company. Boasting 11 halls over an area of 110,000 m2 and more than 6,000 booths, CPSE is listed as one of the largest and, certainly, one of the most influential s...

There's nothing like a visit to the China Public Security Expo (CPSE) in Shenzhen to open your eyes to a new world of security market manufacturers and customers in the Asia-Pacific market. The show is huge by Western standards – someone told me it's five times the size of ISC West in Las Vegas. But even more than the size of the show, it was the crowd that made an impression on this first-time visitor. Huge numbers of attendees and exhibitors Think of the mass of humanity you might exp...

Major art heists often feature audacity that defeats even the most thorough security protocols  Museum security, like art, is ever-changing. Traditional security practices like manned guarding alone are not sufficient to keep thieves at bay. Modern security technologies such as video surveillance, motions detectors, intruder alarms and other physical security devices also play an equally important role in securing museums and its art work. Regrettably, having all the...

The IP surveillance market is taking anunusually long time to reach maturity, partiallydue to lack of industry standards  Video surveillance has been a growth industry ever since the release of the first IP security camera in the mid-1990s. Generally, high-growth industries are immature, meaning they have not yet reached a state of equilibrium. This is particularly true in the IP video surveillance market where many new companies enter the market takin...

Discussions in our industry about cyber-threats to physical security systems, including IP video, often centre around hypotheticals. How might a hacker gain access to a video camera feed? How might he or she enter the larger enterprise system through a software vulnerability related to physical security? We all know assessing threats often involves considering the hypothetical, of course, but we should also seek to learn from actual events in the past. In relation to vulnerabilities of video su...

In the last 10 years CCTV manufacturers havebegun offering video search solutions aimedto reduce time and effort involved in searches Petabytes of security video recorded around the world every day. Obviously, we feel more secure knowing that we can “turn back time” and investigate the past – at least in situations for which video surveillance exists. However, people who have experience requesting CCTV footage would say: “This takes way too much time.&...

We all know that security video cameras are becoming smarter. The IP cameras at the edge of today’s video surveillance systems contain computer chips that can potentially change how cameras are used. However, despite the changing technology and greater intelligence at the edge, today’s systems mostly use video cameras for one thing – to provide video. In some cases, the cameras provide hours and hours of video that no one will ever watch.  Re-examining the role of video...

NVRs make it easy to benefit from HD solutions and integrations to access control, alarm systems, intercoms and other technologies Developments in the IP video camera market have a direct impact on the other components in a system. With the emergence of higher definition cameras – whether 4K cameras or 8K or even higher – the market now needs back-end devices that can perform the decoding work. Also, more intelligence is needed, including smart functions such as pe...

How do you get all of your various vendors, services, resources, manpower, and technology to integrate and work together? Creating an efficient operating environment in physical security is no small feat - especially when the organisation undertaking such an endeavour has a nationwide presence. How do you get all of your various vendors, services, resources, manpower, and technology to integrate and work together? How do you aggregate all of the data being recorded into in...

With more physical security systems using Internet protocol and being connected to the enterprise IT network, it’s not surprising that the corporate IT department is more involved than ever in the buying decision – for better or worse. Does the IT department bring valuable resources to the table, or are they an impediment to the sales and integration process? It’s not a new issue, but an increasingly important one as the industry changes. We asked this week’s Expert Panel...

As technology advances and more surveillance features become available, it can be difficult for security integrators to know which system will fit their customer’s needs It’s no secret that Internet Protocol (IP) cameras are on a steady march to replace analogue video. Network-centric surveillance cameras bring a host of value to the protected premises, above and beyond traditional physical security. Now, cameras are increasingly used for safety, such as in liabili...

VIIDOS were established to deal with thehuge increase in surveillance dataavailable to investigators We need CCTV footage to reveal the true story of what happened before, during, and after a crime. We need to put those forensic images before the court in a manner that has integrity and obeys the rules, codes and legislation that have evolved in this rapidly changing digital era. To do that successfully, we must consider all the contributing elements of a CCTV i...

Hikvision USA’s ascension from virtual obscurity to the upper tier of manufacturers in the U.S. market is being built on the Chinese company’s huge manufacturing capacity – they turn out 50,000 to 60,000 surveillance cameras every day from factories in China. The large capacity enables Hikvision to achieve economies of scale. In effect, they can make high quality video surveillance products at a lower price, a capability that will continue to serve them well as they begin compe...

Software changes constantly. There’s always a new patch or fix, and our computers persistently remind us that an update is available. As a core component of today’s IP networked video systems, video management software (VMS) is also subject to the need to be constantly updated and refined. We asked our Expert Panel Roundtable to elaborate: Why is it important that networked video customers keep up to date with the latest version of video management software (VMS)?

Ballantyne has created the "Three Vectors of Value" for video surveillance - Awareness, Evidence and Behaviiour   The annual global expenditure in new video surveillance systems is currently estimated at about 20 billion USD and grows at a rate of better than 15% per year. To those of us in the business, these figures both encourage and validate. The expenditure is impressive, but only because commensurate value is delivered. That is, we expect expenditure and value to ba...

Foot traffic improved a little on the second day of ASIS International in Anaheim, California. Furthermore, the high quality of meetings at the big industry show tended to overshadow complaints about attendance. There is plenty to talk about in Anaheim. “The conversations have been much more substantial than you usually have at a trade show,” says Charles Hunger, Product Marketing Director, Anviz Global Inc. “They’re not general conversations, they’re ‘How ca...

The potential costs and consequences of hackers getting through firewalls and onto the user’s computer networks can be devastating Theft of NATO data. Leakage of emails. Hackers setting up a live streaming website for over 100 New York City private webcams and even hacking the infrastructure servers of the U.S. government. As news of malicious takeover of private and corporate networks as well as incidents of malicious software programs, referred to as malware, conti...

NVR appliances ease analogue to IP transition by providing end users with a hybrid-ready product There should be a palatable migration path from a large installed base of analogue to the latest IP technology. The biggest missed opportunity related to network video recorder (NVR) NVR appliances in the video surveillance marketplace is effectively using existing analogue camera investments while transitioning to the network. For example, IP encoders can be utilised as a brid...

Have interactive services lost their edge? Are users discouraged and disenthralled? That’s a myth that needs busting, because security companies continue to have success offering these solutions to customers. Alarm companies who began their business with traditional intrusion detection continue to deliver interactive services as part of a total, connected home solution. Companies like Complete Security Systems, Marlboro, N.J.; Marshall Alarm Systems, Yorktown Heights, N.Y.; and The Securi...

ASIS is a great opportunity to not only learn about new technologies first hand, but also to benchmark offerings against competitors  Now in its 61st year, the American Society of Industrial Security (ASIS) Seminar & Exhibits is more than an end-user show. Many systems integrators also attend, walk the show and even exhibit to meet with potential customers and perhaps see technology they may need to apply to their clients’ security challenges and issues. This ye...

The industry is counting down to the big industry trade show this fall, the ASIS International 61st Annual Seminar and Exhibits — ASIS 2015 in Anaheim, California. What topics will dominate the traditionally end user-based show in a year of shifting technologies and new capabilities on the horizon? We asked our Expert Panel Round Table to weigh in.

The research from Australia shows “significant growth” in the use of CCTV by councils New research from Australia shows “significant growth” in the use of CCTV by councils and an increase in the size and sophistication of systems. The research, contained in a report by the Australian Institute of Criminology, was designed to measure the use of CCTV by local councils in Australia using an online national survey of local government, to gauge the extent an...

IP video recording systems offer high-resimaging, speed & analytics to its end users  Familiarity with analogue systems Familiarity is one factor in the slow conversion of casino customers to IP technologies. Many end users and integrators are comfortable with and have long-term experience with the more simplistic analogue systems. However, as IP systems continue to become easier to install and maintain with more plug-and-play technology, this dynamic shoul...

In a school security lockdown, teachers typically display red or green cards on the doors or in the windows of their classrooms. The manual procedure uses red cards to alert to a crisis condition; green cards designate that everything is safe inside the classroom or office. Colour-coded crisis management system Physical security company Sielox has adapted the idea of using a colour scheme to characterise an emergency situation into its electronic security system. CLASS [Crisis Lockdown Alert S...

 IP is here and is continuing to proliferate in the security industry and its next major advancement is in pure IP access control IP technologies in the security industry are nearly ubiquitous today. End users and integrators have adopted and embraced IP cameras, building automation systems, wireless mesh networks, alarms, monitoring, and regularly view all of these technologies from the palm of their hand, on their smart phone. The technologies are easier to install, oft...