Take a Smarter, Safer Approach to School Security

Year over year, school planning strategies emphasize safety and security. The primary goal when planning for a school district is to provide students and teachers with the ability to learn and share in a safe and secure environment. To foster a productive learning environment, administrators should have the ability to: Ensure student and staff safety Deter violence and theft Minimize vandalism and other costly repairs Easily investigate incidents In addition to an already long list of goals and challenges, districts should prepare to adapt to new technologies and teaching environments or unknown new obstacles that may emerge – including time, budget, and personnel. These potential challenges may have to be accomplished with even more limited resources, creating a need to feel assured about your investment. 5 Considerations When Taking a Smarter, Safer Approach to School Security 1. Are the systems all connected and secure? Historically, school districts have had disparate security systems that incorporate arbitrary analog equipment from a variety of vendors across all facilities on an ad hoc basis. As a result, troubleshooting issues become a problem since different companies are only responsible for a small piece of the total system. Whenever a problem arises, calls need to be made to several vendors and manufacturers in a costly and time-consuming attempt to fix the issue – leading to added stress and wasted time. Issues can be avoided with an integrated and centrally managed security solution that can address multiple needs, reduce downtime, lower costs, and improve satisfaction. Building a solution from a single supplier ensures that every piece of the system was designed, built, and tested to work together. 2. Is this something you will need to budget for once, or every year? Although hardware may be a one-time purchase, many software licenses for managing the system and access to support, require recurring fees. Budgeting for something once is often easier than budgeting for it every year. If this is the case for your district, ask about security solutions without recurring fees, whether monthly or annually. 3. Do you trust the supplier? You should feel confident about your trust in both the security solution and supplier in which those systems come from. Relationships are important when doing business, and you want to have the same trust in the companies you are investing in. 4. Is the system easy to use? Do you have a dedicated security team, or is that “team” one person? Does your security strategy require 24-hour surveillance to monitor video feeds, or do you only check feeds after an incident occurs? Either way, network security solutions can enable schools to take advantage of the resources available to them. A solution that is easy and intuitive to use is essential for more limited security staff. Remote monitoring capabilities can also provide added value for schools with limited security staff. 5. Will the system grow with us? Acquiring a new security solution is a large investment to address your current security needs. But what about a solution built for the future of your district? Understanding how scalable a solution is and what other possibilities exist can help build confidence that you chose the right system. Even if phase one of a security solution is built with a few cameras, a network video recorder, and video management software, it ensures the potential to grow your system. As the unique needs grow across the entire district from kindergarten to high school, there may be cases to add network audio, intercoms, access control, and analytics to reach new heights. Choosing an Integrated Network Security Solution Integrated network security platform partners, such as Axis Communications, enable schools to take a best-fit approach across their district. These platforms allow facilities to leverage video surveillance solutions, audio and announcement capabilities, reliable access control, and a single point of contact to help reduce downtime and improve efficiency. An integrated network security solution can provide more control and flexibility, including: Intelligent video to provide situational awareness: High-resolution images in any lighting condition and active alerts can help schools reduce risks including, bullying, vandalism, and absenteeism. Access control to ensure student and staff safety: Let the right people in and keep the wrong people out. You can remotely screen visitors and grant after-hour school access without additional staff costs.  Audio solutions to enable clear communication: You can send messages anywhere inside or outside your school – even remotely from your smartphone. Sophisticated recorders and video management software to give you full control: Trusted video management software that is intuitive and easy to operate is a reliable tool for exporting evidence. It can connect and manage all parts of your security solution in one place. The Smarter, Safer Step When committing to something like a wholesome security solution, you want to ensure you are investing in a reliable and versatile solution with access to the support you need. With an integrated security platform partner, like Axis, you have the benefit of saving yourself time, resources, and peace of mind. In addition to high quality and reliable products, working with Axis means you are also working with Axis’ extensive partner network to ensure you get a solution customized for your needs.   The opinions expressed in this piece are solely Axis’. They do not necessarily represent WESCO’s views.

Critical Infrastructure: Perimeter Protection

Your security site plan can have a lot of moving parts. For critical infrastructure sites (i.e., power plants – nuclear, gas, electrical or solar, petroleum refineries, data centers, etc.), it’s important to know what’s happening inside and outside, regardless if you’re onsite or not. Not knowing what’s going on is, to put it mildly, discomforting. Yet, knowing that something has happened, but not sure exactly what that might be, can be just as frustrating. Consider the concern for worrisome activities occurring right under your nose while you’re onsite focused in one particular area while an event is occurring at another. Network video surveillance offers versatile layered perimeter protection that allows you to find out what’s going on around and within your critical infrastructure in real time, enabling resourceful and cost-effective protection.  Traditional Measures for Perimeter Protection To safeguard against trespassing, theft and vandalism, governments, public and private utilities and other owners of critical infrastructure invest in various perimeter protection measures. Traditionally, these measures relied on technologies such as short-distance radar, lasers, ground sensors, motion sensors or motion-sensitive fence wires. They all perform well, and can capably detect intrusions under many circumstances. In recent years, the development of advanced algorithms has helped in filtering false alarms from many of these devices, but a consistent, reliable means to verify true and false alarms is still needed.   Network Video for a Clear Picture and Strong Decision Support With network video cameras it’s possible to build an intelligent and reliable surveillance system dedicated to protecting the perimeters of all kinds of critical infrastructure with analytics at the edge. A vast range of products make such IP-based systems versatile and high-performing, especially in poorly lit environments, or in varying and/or demanding weather conditions. Video analytics at the edge (or perimeter) minimizes video processing on the back end, which simplifies balancing the entire system from the edge to the data center. Edge analytics also enables easier and faster scaling to accommodate more points of video capture and analysis. With the functionality to add smart analytics directly to the camera, your system can serve and protect you and your assets with or without you onsite. Clear and crisp images and high-performing smart analytics facilitate detection and identification of objects, people and incidents making it easier to separate true alarms from false alarms that don’t require a response. This provides better ROI than older systems as an individual tasked with traveling to the site to make this determination is no longer required. Again, these systems provide high-quality images, enabling advanced features such as video motion detection, virtual fence or cross-line detection. Moreover, a network camera can be configured to sustain an alarm trigger outside of the fence offering an earlier detection. As an example, you can pair the cameras with object filtration which reduces the number of false alarms by only reacting to objects that fulfill certain, predetermined criteria, such as size, speed, etc. Detect – Verify – Act: How it Works The main objective for critical infrastructure perimeter protection is to detect a threat or an intrusion at the earliest possible stage. However, areas where critical infrastructure exists can pose a significant challenge for security managers. The sheer size of these campuses can be a problem. Variable lighting conditions can also present a problem especially at night when shadows and blind spots can cause significant issues. 1. Detect: First Line of Defense – Thermal Network Cameras Modern thermal network cameras are very sensitive and accurate. They are unrivaled when it comes to detection, making them an ideal first line of defense. Challenging environmental conditions such as looking into sunlight, light fog, or smoke is difficult for visible cameras. Thermal cameras don’t use reflected light for imaging and therefore are not affected by the challenging environments. Once a suspicious event has been detected, the thermal camera can be configured so that it automatically directs a PTZ (pan/tilt/zoom) camera to the place the incident occurred. Working in parallel, these two camera types form an unbeatable combination. 2. Verify: On Top With PTZ Domes and Fixed Cameras After a detection, verification must follow before decisions on further actions can be made. PTZ cameras are adaptable and enable an operator to pan, tilt and zoom the camera remotely to quickly analyze the situation. State-of-the-art network cameras deliver sharp images with very high resolution, enabling facial identification or even license plate recognition over long distances. Special low-light technology reduces noise and maintains colors even in very dark conditions, greatly enhancing the user’s ability to recognize and identify people, vehicles and incidents. 3. Act: Automatic Notification When an alarm is triggered, a real-time notification is automatically sent by e-mail. Using a remote viewing app, the receiver can then see a live stream from the camera or a recording of the triggering event. Based on this information, it is easy to decide on the appropriate course of action. There are several other video and audio analytics that add sophistication and support to video systems. Protect High-Value Assets in any Light, Weather or Distance Automated detection of perimeter breach allows operators to monitor incidents more efficiently. Safeguard Your Facility and Your Wallet Network camera surveillance for critical infrastructure perimeter protection enables you not only to detect a possible intruder at the earliest stage possible, but to verify the extent and severity of a breach. These security systems can be configured to provide essential information to adopt an appropriate response based on feedback from the system itself. Furthermore, by checking video streams, it is easy to distinguish between false alarms and real intrusions requiring immediate action. The versatility of IP-based security solutions, including the right combination of network cameras, applications, radar, video analytics software and other add-ons, creates a system that is flexible, scalable and cost effective. The opinions expressed in this piece are solely Axis’. They do not necessarily represent WESCO’s views.

Physical Security and Cybersecurity: Are They Really So Different?

The “Internet of Things” has evolved from buzzword status to mainstream reality, but not without its challenges. While most still think of millions of IP-enabled devices as an exciting opportunity, 2018 gave us a sobering reminder of the pitfalls of not properly securing our internet-connected refrigerators, DVRs and thermostats. What Exactly is the Internet of Things and How Does it Relate to Me? The Internet of Things, or IoT, is the network of interconnected devices and solutions enabled to send and receive data via the internet. As a growing number of devices begin connecting to the internet, hackers are finding more opportunities to get access and steal user data. IP surveillance systems in particular have become high-profile targets for hackers the last few years. The significant vulnerability of lower-end devices made headlines last year when a relatively simple hack of IP cameras allowed the take down of the famous security blog and global DNS provider, DYN. For anyone even remotely familiar with IP security, the banality of the script used in the hack, now known as Mirai, would be extremely disappointing – the equivalent of leaving your front door unlocked or your keys on the front steps. Continuing with that analogy, Mirai is like a bunch of goons walking from door to door looking for those keys, attempting one common password after another. At a basic level cybersecurity is about risk management. While we know it’s impossible to eliminate all risks, and that sometimes even protecting against just some risks can be extremely expensive, it’s important to consider the top priorities for you and your organization. Identify your “crown jewels” and find ways to guard them fiercely. Four Steps to Identify Your Level of Risk Start by figuring out what an acceptable level of risk is, then sort those risks into two different buckets: risk with impact that you can easily mitigate, or risk that you can transfer via some form of insurance. One of the biggest challenges in cybersecurity is striking a balance between gaining knowledge of your vulnerabilities and securing the right solutions. If too much time is spent focusing on one over the other, you could face a significant security breach. In practice, it’s impossible to determine the likelihood or impact of any given vulnerability. A security breach is binary – it is either exploited or it’s not. What are the chances that someone will discover the vulnerability and then actually write a useful script to exploit it? In an effort to stay ahead of a hack-able vulnerabilities for, IP-connected security devices can be used to decrease the likelihood of cyber-attacks. No matter if you are responsible for your organization’s physical security or cybersecurity, you can apply the same principles to audit your vulnerability. 1. Identify Your Assets and Resources (What) Regarding IP-connected cameras, besides the camera itself the main asset involved would be the video feed from the camera or from any video stored locally on your servers. In most situations video assets may be valuable, but of little use to anyone else. Think carefully about why an intruder might be interested in those assets. In addition to video content, user credentials, network configuration information and potential service interfaces could all provide useful intelligence to support broader attacks. 2. Identify Plausible Threats (Who and Why) There are a few different credible threats to consider for an IP camera system: Physical sabotage of the cameras, or of the location the cameras are surveying Leaked video content Using the device as an intrusion point for the broader network It’s also important to consider who could be a plausible attacker and what their motivation might be. Think about the types of vulnerabilities they might want to take advantage of and which security controls might be of interest to them specifically. 3. Identify Plausible Vulnerabilities That Could Be Exploited (How) Obviously, no system is completely invulnerable. Any network or device must be exposed to the outside world to some degree to be of any use. It’s also obvious that some vulnerabilities are more easily mitigated than others. For example, although the physical exposure of any camera makes it vulnerable, it’s one of the easier circumstances to control. Start by doing your due diligence to make sure IP-connected cameras can withstand extreme physical conditions. Then consider any additional non-physical vulnerabilities, such as exposed passwords or credentials that access video management systems, or insufficient hardening and maintenance of the network. 4. Identify the Expected Cost of a Successful Attack (How Much) This stage is important because if you don’t know the cost of a successful attack then you won’t know how much to invest in securing your system in the first place. If the cameras being used are in a mundane environment with little to no chance of being used as a network entry point, then you may find the cost of a breach to be very low. However if your situation is more sensitive and a breach in your network could expose your organization to financial or reputational losses, then the associated costs to secure the network will be (and should be) much higher. These considerations will help you decide how much time and energy you should invest into securing your network systems. Incremental Change for a Long-Term Solution The main thing to keep in mind is that cybersecurity is a process, not a product. Threats must be managed on a system-wide level. The responsibility to secure a network, its connected devices and the family of services it supports falls not only on those individuals who manage the network and its users, but across the entire vendor supply chain. Technology is important, but one single product could never eliminate all risks or threats. As technology and security improves, so do the abilities of hackers working to circumvent those measures. Treating security as an on-going scalable project can help ensure your network is prepared to face whatever threats might come its way. Article originally published Sep 25, 2017, and updated for accuracy and relevance. The opinions expressed in this piece are solely Axis Communications'. They do not necessarily represent WESCO’s views.

5 Keys to Better Video Surveillance Image Quality

When a surveillance camera is installed, you want to know that the images it captures will be crisp, clear and useful. To get the most from video surveillance, it’s important to understand the basic factors that contribute to good image usability. Learn how light affects exposure settings and contributes to image quality to guarantee that your images always look sharp, never fuzzy. Here are five imaging principles you can use to ensure ideal image quality from your video surveillance system. 1. Adapt to Any Type of Light The sun rises in the morning and travels across the sky during the day, changing the direction of light. It’s always a good idea to have the sun behind the camera, not in front of the lens. This avoids potentially blinding backlight situations. Clouds and bad weather conditions affect the intensity of sunlight, creating a need to change exposure settings in the camera. The time of day affects the color of sunlight, also referred to as the color temperature. Sunlight is neutral at midday and changes to warm, intense colors at sunrise and sunset. All of these light parameters affect how images are perceived in video surveillance. Light direction, light intensity and color temperature need to be correctly handled to ensure sharp images in any type of light. 2. The Right Exposure in Rain or Shine In bright daylight, each scene holds a lot of light energy. More light means less exposure is needed. A well-illuminated scene doesn’t need to be exposed through the lens element and onto the sensor for very long to achieve the required exposure value. On the other hand, each scene holds less light in cloudy weather. That means the scene needs to be exposed through the lens element and onto the sensor for a longer period of time. An alternative to achieving the correct exposure value is increasing the iris opening. A camera iris is an aperture that adjusts to control the amount of light coming in through a lens. This lets more light flow into the camera per unit of time. If you choose to increase the iris opening, keep in mind that: short exposure times limit motion blur, and, small iris openings increase depth of field. 3. Stay Focused With Depth of Field If the outside scene is sunny, the iris opening can be reduced. Partly closing the iris improves your depth of field, or the distance between the closest and farthest objects that can be in focus. Zooming in on an object greatly limits the surveillance opportunities in the surrounding areas. If you simultaneously zoom in and have the iris fully open because light is limited, the depth of field is reduced further. 4. Understand Pixel Size and Detail When comparing camera sensors, it’s clear that the finer the pixel grid, the better it recreates details in a surveillance scene. Generally, a larger sensor can gain more information and produce clearer images than a smaller one. Larger sensors are also typically more expensive. But when you compare a low-resolution image that offers only an outline to an image showing finer details from higher-resolution cameras, the advantages speak for themselves. Consider the level of detail you need from your video surveillance system when choosing a camera. 5. Better Lighting With Wide Dynamic Range A scene that holds great variances in contrast requires separate exposures to offer full detail in both dark and light areas of the scene. As the exposure time increases, more of the details in darker areas become visible. "Wide dynamic range" is a feature that allows objects in light and dark areas to be observed. With this feature, the camera takes two exposures of the full scene. These are then merged together to achieve the final result, offering a wider dynamic range. The Path to Better Image Quality Understanding depth of field and exposure value will help you capture clearer images with your video surveillance system. Not all surveillance cameras are made equal, but by using these imaging principles, you can be on the path to clearer, sharper images. The opinions expressed in this piece are solely Axis’. They do not necessarily represent WESCO’s views. Check out another related article from Axis: How to Give Your Customers a First-Rate Video Surveillance System

How to Give Your Customers a First-Rate Video Surveillance System

There is much to consider when helping customers design a complete video surveillance system. Getting started will involve selecting the right materials, understanding the installation process, and knowing how to prepare for future growth and change. Understand the Customer’s Needs You first must understand the customer’s needs and how to set reasonable expectations. Here are some important questions to ask them before getting started: Are they looking for general overview surveillance, or do they need to identify individuals? Will they record continuously or only when events occur? Will they view the recordings locally or from a remote location? What will happen to the recorded material? Will they record indoors and/or outdoors? How does local legislation regulate video and/or audio surveillance? Survey the Site Once you know the customer’s goals, be sure to visit the site where the surveillance equipment will be installed. Begin by drawing the location to help assess camera placement, types and positions, lens selection, and functional specifications. Make sure to also bring the right tools, including a lux meter, distance meter, and digital or standard video cameras. Design the System You will be ready to design the system once you’ve surveyed the site. Be sure to address these questions when you reach this phase: Which distances need to be covered? What is the available lighting? What is the required field of view for each camera? Which cameras and lenses are required based on the actual layout of the building or surveillance area? What degrees of movement are there in the settings you will record? What are the actual mounting options? Are there obstructions or design changes not reflected in the drawings? What types of infrastructure, such as cables, switches and computers, are already available? Which functionality is required? (This might include PTZ, audio, day/night functionality, or input/output connections to external equipment such as passive infrared sensors.) And Now for Next Steps Once you’ve successfully installed your customer’s system, they’ll be prepared to make the next move. They can take advantage of the various network technologies that can support and provide the many benefits of a network video system. These will also be crucial to guiding future technical decisions and security plans. The opinions expressed in this piece are solely Axis’. They do not necessarily represent WESCO’s views. Check out another related article from Axis: 10 Reasons to Switch to IP-Based Video