License plate recognition - Security beat

An attention-grabbing exhibit at GSX 2024 in Orlando involved a robot dog that could open a door.  Boston Dynamics robot dog ASSA ABLOY impressed attendees with the robotics demonstration, featuring the Boston Dynamics robot dog that could open a door using either an HID credential or a mechanical grip. This innovation represents a shift toward more autonomous security solutions and is suitable for environments where human access may be limited. ASSA ABLOY impressed attendee...

GSX 2023 has its share of new product announcements, although many of the new products are enhancements to technologies shown at last spring’s ISC West show in Las Vegas. Booth traffic on the first day seemed busy at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center in Dallas, although one exhibitor complained that it takes some time for the traffic to make its way to the farthest areas of the show floor. Apparent throughout the GSX show is an expanding idea of what constitutes security. Incre...

The trend of video customers moving to the cloud has reached a tipping point. At the same time, artificial intelligence (AI) is being adopted on a massive scale. Combining the two trends adds a higher level of value than either component individually. Merging the power of AI and the cloud is a driving force behind cloud surveillance company Eagle Eye Networks’ acquisition of Uncanny Vision, an AI and video analytics company headquartered in Bangalore, India. Expensive AI resources Clou...

A new generation of video cameras is poised to boost capabilities dramatically at the edge of the IP network, including more powerful artificial intelligence (AI) and higher resolutions, and paving the way for new applications that would have previously been too expensive or complex. Technologies at the heart of the coming new generation of video cameras are Ambarella’s newest systems on chips (SoCs). Ambarella’s CV5S and CV52S product families are bringing a new level of on-camera...

The COVID-19 pandemic has provided a double challenge to physical security systems integrators. For one thing, they have had to adapt their own businesses to survive and thrive during the pandemic. On the other hand, they have also been faced with new challenges to serve their customer’s changing needs. Global pandemic effects One integrator company, North American Video (NAV) took the now-familiar steps most companies confronted to adapt their business model to operations in a global pa...

Security’s intersection with consumer electronics is on view at CES 2020, the world’s largest technology event, Jan. 7-10 in Las Vegas. The giant show features more than 170,000 attendees, 4,500 exhibitors and 1,100 industry thought-leaders featured on the CES stage. A range of technologies will be on display, from artificial intelligence (AI) to 5G, vehicle technology to AR/VR (augmented and virtual reality), robotics to home automation. Security plays a prominent role, too.The imp...

As police use of live facial recognition (LFR) is called into question in the United Kingdom, the concerns can overshadow another use of facial recognition by police officers. Facial recognition is incorporated into day-to-day police operations to identify an individual standing in front of them. This more common usage should not be called into question, says Simon Hall, CEO of Coeus Software, which developed PoliceBox, a software that enables police officers to complete the majority of their...

Artificial intelligence (AI) is expanding the capabilities of license plate readers and vehicle identification systems. Within a smart/safe city scenario, automatic license plate reader solutions are used to help analyse real-time video streams for site surveillance, inspection and public safety, and to offer actional information through a network of connected camera systems. Outside of law enforcement, this can include other public safety initiatives such as traffic tolls, car counting, and pa...

The basic need for public safety is one of the biggest forces driving the adoption of smart city solutions: approaches that seek to solve urban challenges through technological means. The thinking behind these initiatives is that with enough internet connectivity and real-time data, surely environmental, social, economic, and public health issues should become more manageable. However, just adding more technology is not the whole answer. Although technology is necessary for an urban area to tra...

The mindset behind a new law to prohibit the use of facial recognition and other security-related technologies by San Francisco police and other city agencies is obvious in the name of the new ordinance: “Stop Secret Surveillance.” Ordinance to stop secret surveillance The San Francisco Board of Supervisors passed the ordinance 8-1 with two abstentions on May 14, and there will be another vote next week before it becomes law. We have an outsize responsibility to regulate the exces...

Knightscope’s long-term mission is to “make America the safest country in the world,” says William Santana Li, Chairman and CEO. “The company was started six years ago as we had grown tired and horrified by the ongoing violence in our country and decided to do something about it.” But are security robots the solution to crime and violence in the United States? “There are 2+ million law enforcement and security professionals trying to secure 328+ million peopl...

MIPS (Milestone Integration Platform Symposium) Copenhagen 2019 saw Milestone Systems double down on the ‘creating an intelligent world’ theme from 2018 and expand it to ‘exploring an intelligent world.’ “The intelligent world theme was bigger than we could cover in one year!” said Malou Toft, VP of EMEA at Milestone Systems. Isolate important events With 865+ registered attendees and more than 47 exhibiting partners in Denmark, this is the largest Communit...

A rapid string of merger and acquisition (M&A) transactions as 2018 passed into 2019 suggests the physical security industry may be on the verge of a busy year of companies buying other companies. Observers have noted a large amount of investment capital currently available to be invested in security M&A, and plenty of entrepreneurial companies are looking to be acquired. Joe Grillo, CEO of ACRE, previously hinted at upcoming M&A activity for his company by the end of 2018, foreshad...

Security solutions today do more than merely observe and prevent criminal activity. Systems are increasingly tasked with making sense of the world around us. At Intersec 2018, which took place 21st - 23rd January in Dubai, manufacturers set out to show how predictive analytics and artificial intelligence are already being used in real world applications: predicting criminal behaviour, managing traffic, and streamlining smart city operations. Dubai smart city initiatives Dubai is a particu...

A technology poised to transform the physical security market is deep learning, which is a neural network approach to machine learning, differentiated by an ability to train using large data sets for greater accuracy. In effect, the system “learns” by looking at lots of data to achieve artificial intelligence (AI). Phases of deep learning I heard a lot about AI, including how it can transform the physical security marketplace, when I attended NVIDIA’s GPU Technology Conferenc...

Axis Communications, the global provider of intelligent surveillance technology, yesterday held the official launch of the new Axis Experience Centre in Luton. The event was a chance for Axis’ partners to meet with the senior management team and explore how the new centre operates, all the while celebrating the company’s 20th anniversary over a glass of champagne. The centre was officially opened by Axis Communications co-founder Martin Gren, along with Bodil Sonesson, the comp...

ISC West in Las Vegas kicked off Wednesday with an expanding focus on new technologies and new applications, including some that go beyond any narrow definition of “the security industry.” Qognify QBlock and Cloudscann “Technology is disrupting the market and executives are taking our solutions beyond security,” says Moti Shabtai, CEO and President of Qognify. “They are starting with security and quickly moving to other risk and business continuity issues in the...

Several of the hot trends in the physical security industry – robots, drones, video analytics – have one thing in common: The need for greater intelligence. More complex physical security systems that incorporate artificial intelligence, deep learning, speech recognition and other sophisticated functions depend on a higher-than-ever level of computing power inside embedded devices at the edge. Graphics processing unit Graphics processing unit (GPU) manufacturer NVIDIA is empowering...

The amount of data generated by today’s video systems – whether resulting from increasing camera counts and/or higher resolutions such as 4K – is presenting new challenges when it comes to storing the data and making it instantly accessible to end users. The surge in data is opening the way in our market for new, more sophisticated IT systems to manage and store the data. In fact, the sheer volume of video data and increasing application demands make some legacy approaches obso...

Creating and accessing intelligence is increasingly part of the mission of corporate security departments, and of Safe Cities applications. Such capabilities were previously the domain of military and government applications, but the same approaches used to provide intelligence from military bases can also be applied to Safe Cities and corporate security projects. Edge360 is a six-year-old company with roots in the military and Department of Defence surveillance. Now, Edge360 is looking to app...

IFSEC International 2016 by all measures was a successful show. Two of the three days clearly met (or exceeded) exhibitors’ expectations. The third day was slower, but is it any wonder? Heavy rains and resulting commuter train complications would have discouraged all but the most determined. And there was another distraction, too: It was the day of the Brexit vote, when the United Kingdom made history. Results of that momentous vote underlined the sense of uncertainty I felt on the first...

Check out our recent interview with Scott Schafer at IFSEC 2015 hereScott Schafer of Arecont Vision is outspoken about the limitations of standard resolution/VGA video cameras. The megapixel camera company’s Executive Vice President says standard resolution and analogue video cameras are the “most toxic asset” at end user companies because they produce the least value for the money. Megapixel video cameras, like those made by Arecont Vision, are much more cost-effective, says S...

Advances in LPR: License plate recognition (LPR) is used widely today in law enforcement applications, but the enterprise security market is also catching on to benefits of the technology – especially when it is combined with other video analytics. PlateSmart Technologies, Oldsmar, Fla., is working to maximise those benefits and to use LPR as a real-time, proactive tool for physical security. PlateSmart’s ARES Enterprise Video Analytics System is a software-only platform that combi...

Highlighting China’s Video Surveillance Giants, this is the first in a series of articles on the growing international presence of China’s top three video surveillance/CCTV companies. See other articles in the series from Dahua and Uniview here and here. For three years now, Hikvision Digital Technology Co. has been ranked as the world’s largest CCTV and video surveillance equipment provider. IHS Research estimates the Chinese manufacturing giant’s global market share in...