The era of network CCTV is here, a seminar heard. A manufacturer hails the future and tells consultants and installers to beware: there?s going to be a change in the market over the next few years.
Dedicated CCTV and security networks will emerge within organisations, linked to the corporate network. So predicted Alastair McLeod, Visimetrics Managing Director. IT managers are resistant to putting security on their corporate networks, seeing security as a necessary evil. Another prediction was the drive towards integration of management information systems, and fire, security and safety systems. He told an IFSEC audience that digital CCTV systems are now a reality. Whereas IFSEC 2001 was dominated by digital recording, IFSEC 2002 was about digital CCTV over IP (Internet Protocol). ‘There is a proliferation of ethernet CCTV products, but few ethernet CCTV installations yet,’ he said. ‘It is obvious from a walk around the [IFSEC] show that CCTV and IT are merging in much the same way that CCTV and access control have merged.’More and more end users have large networks with a high capacity, available anywhere; even small companies have some kind of network , and new buildings are being constructed with structured cabling for a network. ‘A camera becomes simply another device you plug into your network.’He outlined what digital recording offers: instant access to recordings, flexible recording schedules and alarm handling, and networkable remote access and multiple access points. As for complying with the Data Protection Act, there is an evidentially robust audit trail, to prove images have not been altered; a trail that will tell you who logged on and viewed which images. He added: ‘There are still plenty of people talking nonsense about evidential integrity, but it is no longer a problem for digital systems.’ Ethernet CCTV can use a building’s existing structured cabling, to carry audio and video control, and alarm inputs and outputs, on a single cable, to a recorder or loudspeaker. Operator access to such a system is from standard IT equipment such as a PC.
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Why so few
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Why so few ethernet CCTV installations yet’ 1) End users do not realise you can do it yet.While an IT manager may be scared of using up all the network’s bandwidth, that will become less of a problem as bandwidth increases and dedicated networks are used for security. 2) Alastair McLeod spoke of a ‘huge lack of installer expertise’. Installers who may have been alarm engineers face having to become IT-literate. Installations companies will change – for one thing, telecoms firms may get in on the act, he suggested.
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Why change
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Why change from analogue to ethernet CCTV’ he asked. End users will add on an ethernet component, and a networked digital video recorder. Users will add ethernet CCTV to remote sites (which in fact could mean a nearby building) for ease of access and lower costs, he suggested: ‘The market will start to realise the advantages of wireless networking and exploit this in parallel with ethernet CCTV.’ The occasion of the seminar was to announce Visimetrics’ technology partnership with IndigoVision. The OCTAR Net recorder from Visimetrics and the VideoBridge product from IndigoVision – which enables analogue or digital cameras to be linked over a network – make up a complete basis for an ethernet CCTV system, Alastair McLeod said, allowing for expansion of an existing system, with data available through your desktop PC.
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IT or security users
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Are Visimetrics talking to end users – in banks, for example – with security or IT in their title’ Professional Security asked. In larger companies, Alastair McLeod replied, his firm might be demonstrating and talking to the IT or the security manager, or it might be the same person. Forward-looking companies are seeing a huge overlap so that the security manager has to report to the IT manager, or vice versa, he added. He mentioned two Scottish applications of Visimetrics and IndigoVision equipment – Midlothian Council (featured in the July 2002 print edition of Professional Security magazine) and Prestwick Airport.
