The perfect surveillance system
Dozing guards and fuzzy images are the old face of CCTV. Now
IP-based systems bring new power to this security essential
If you were to base your opinion of CCTV solely on the press it
receives, you might feel it’s a technology that doesn’t pull its
weight. A local paper might complain that a shop theft couldn’t be
investigated because police lacked the resources to scan 18 hours
of footage. Then comes a headline saying that Home Office research*
found that many government-funded CCTV schemes had not yielded the
hoped for reductions in crime.
But dig just a little deeper and a different picture emerges.
Consider these statistics: the UK CCTV market is the strongest in
Europe and 70% of UK organisations are planning to increase their
take-up of CCTV over the next three years. If British business is
putting so much investment into CCTV, it must be firmly convinced
of its worth. And while the recent Home Office research into town
centre schemes did recommend ways in which management and
deployment of CCTV schemes can be improved, pointing to a need for
realistic objectives, good management and staff support, it was
positive about CCTV technology overall.
Flexible and effective tool
Holding some systems back is a reliance on legacy technology, which
is not always able to meet modern expectations. However, with the
aid of current technology and good implementation, CCTV is a very
powerful tool for deterring many kinds of crime. For organisations
who apply CCTV effectively, it can lower the incidence of crime at
their premises and against their customers.
As British Security Industry Association Chief Executive David
Dickinson commented: ‘Understanding the objectives of the system,
deployment of cameras, well-trained operators and clear
communication links with the police are all crucial to the overall
effectiveness of systems. In the very best examples, this joined-up
approach can have exceptional results.’
Taking just such a joined-up route is North Lanarkshire Council,
which is using the IP CCTV solution now available from ntl:Telewest
Business via Metro Ethernet VPN. The Council is implementing one of
the largest IP CCTV solutions in Europe, a £3m investment, tying in
its new Central Monitoring Unit to CCTV schemes throughout the
North Lanarkshire region.
Happily, for North Lanarkshire, recognition of the value of CCTV
is not an obstacle. In contrast, it is public demand for cameras
that has largely moved the project forward, says Emma Walker,
Project Manager at North Lanarkshire CCTV Ltd, which monitors,
manages and administers the public space CCTV network on behalf of
North Lanarkshire Council: “One of the biggest criteria for us in
upgrading the system was future expansion. Historically, our
cameras have been monitored from four police stations around North
Lanarkshire and we were limited by the capacity within the
stations. The new 2Gb system allows us to scale up from our current
235 cameras to as many as 440. There’s always a demand for more
cameras and the flexibility of the system means we won’t need to go
through this process a few years down the line.”
Flexibility is the major benefit of an IP-based system, explains
Matt McCloskey, Senior Manager, Application and Services at
ntl:Telewest Business: ‘Adding cameras requires more bandwidth, but
this can be done remotely, as opposed to having to lay a piece of
fibre from the new camera back to where you view it. Essentially,
customers can bring any number of new cameras online, as they are
needed.’
Tricks of the trade
Network resilience was another important factor in North
Lanarkshire’s decision. Emma says: “We were looking at reducing
downtime. The ntl:Telewest Business solution includes a dual fibre
infrastructure, so if there are any problems the system is
self-healing and data will be routed around the affected
areas.”
To further ensure that nothing is missed, the system has other
tricks up its sleeve. Data from cameras can be stored in a local
memory for as long as you specify and in the rare event of any
interruption the main system will request this missing data
automatically once the network is repaired. Storage to disk
replaces storage to huge cassettes and eliminates that lengthy hunt
for a single incident among hours of footage. ‘You just go to the
terminal or access the server remotely and say 'I want to see this
camera at this time. Done.’ explains Matt.
The IP network will offer other long-term benefits to the
Council. The Evolved Ethernet infrastructure allows
interoperability across North Lanarkshire CCTV and the council
network allowing CCTV pictures to be centrally monitored. Emma
adds: “We now have the opportunity to link the key sites, the
education network and housing departments. We know the capabilities
of the IP CCTV solution and these will be fully realised.”
One of the capabilities Emma will be able to employ is to set up
activities and behaviour prompts that raise an alert of potential
threats. For example, if a piece of luggage is abandoned in a city
centre or a car pulls up to a sensitive location, these actions can
trigger alarms that warn control room staff.
Pro-active face recognition technology can be linked to
databases, helping to pinpoint the location of people thought to be
a potential threat. Also useful is the ability to view images at
one quality and store them at another. You can view with a high
frame-per-second ratio for smooth, steady real-time footage, for
example, while archiving at a lower rate to save on storage space.
In short, IP CCTV provides a versatile toolbox from which to
assemble your perfect surveillance system. The fact that the
solution can incorporate “anything that’s got a camera on it,”
according to Matt, means that there’s no need for a complete
overhaul to access the benefits of digital CCTV.
Matt concludes: “There are 4.25 million cameras in the UK, but
there aren’t 4.25 million people watching them. Our approach is all
about making those existing cameras more effective.”
*Assessing the impact of CCTV, Home Office research study 292,
2005
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