My experience with Video Surveillance so let me share my limited knowledge

[General of Darkness]

The reason I'm posting this is because of the concern many of us have about privacy, precrime etc. I DO NOT have all the answers and would be lying if I said I know it all but I'll try and explain things the best I can.

So to begin, I'm still in IT but started a new job back in February. One of the aspects of my new job is video surveillance and access control (card readers for access), but I'll only limit it to video surveillance.

Video surveillance is comprised of two things, cameras, and the controller. In the residential market it's a DVR (appliance based, i.e. stand alone proprietary product) , in the enterprise world it's an NVR (server based, with GUI interfaces and multiple notifications, PC, text, phone, APP etc)

In the enterprise market space there are tons of cameras but two set themselves apart, Thermal and IR or Infrared. As an example Sony makes excellent IR cameras but they have no Thermal offering, but regardless this is what people are looking at in the enterprise space.

1 - Infrared cameras - Which are generally limited up to 100 feet, but there are some new ones that go out to 500 feet, however the quality is limited
2 - Thermal cameras - Which are EXPENSIVE as shit, 25K each but can go out to several miles and still have the issue of the quality

The GOAL for my customers or people that I'm talking to is not to know who the fuck you are, but to know WHEN someone has crossed a "ZONE" from point A to point B and to alert on that. As an example, if a person hops a fence at LAX and then begins walking down the runway, LAX wants to know that and then have the cameras be able to follow them and send an alert to someone. The difference between Thermal and IR is the distance, and the price reflects that because one really expensive Thermal camera can be cheaper than the infrastructure of 10 - 20 IR cameras and one mall cops driving around in circles.

So that's the basics on cameras, then here is where it get's interesting the NVR software and the analytics. The analytics is what takes the raw data from the camera and turns it into information, or garbage, i.e. shit in shit out. I'll work with a customer to produce a perimeter, kinda like the James Bond red lasers, but in terms of the analytic s, we don't give a shit if something is in X zone, only if it's in Y zone and we can actually get granular to not alert on a cat or dog.

I've been hearing about this whole face recognition stuff for awhile as others have, but at the end of the day is it doable, YES, and it's not a cost issue (if you can print your own money), but an infrastructure issue.

Here's a perfect example of what my customers are looking for.

Geospatial Analysis, it's not the boogeyman, in fact the definition on wiki is pretty spot on. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geospatial_analysis

LAX doesn't even use this, they rely more on morons for the TSA to do this job, when in fact the software is better are it, because it doesn't take breaks and at the end of the day uses examples of artificial intelligence to create a map of what humans do at an airport, i.e. we get to the airport, we check in, check our bags and get on a plane, it's pretty simple. But when a bag is left somewhere unattended, the software will alert on it. The software doesn't view the person as an enemy, it views the inaction as something to be addressed.

Now on the private side, i.e. a theme park, the software will give reports on the basic movements of people. As an example, when it's hot as fuck at 2pm there is a trend of people going towards refreshments maybe the theme park doubles the staff there for better service.

So anyhoo, I'm just sharing that 99% of this shit is not against our interests, but in the interests of the companies for better service, reduced liability etc. Heck even police carrying video cameras on their chests are in our interests because they'll think twice before they go full retard.

In conclusion because I really want to be clear on this based on my experiences. Would the NSA and .gov like to go full Orwellian, YES, can they, NO. However, the problems they have isn't just based on physical parameters, i.e. servers, bandwidth, camera's and MONEY etc, but more importantly, right of way. They don't have access to the information.


FYI, if this country wanted to we could probably secure the entire southern border for under billion dollars with Thermal cameras that have audible alerts, lights sirens etc, that could do ANYTHING, set off mines, 50 cals etc. The only issue that I don't know is the infrastructure, because you need electricity to do things like that and that's where the cost lies.

Anyway, cool story bro.

[Libertytree]

I believe that the .govs tech is 30-50 years ahead of whatever tech is available to the public.

[General of Darkness]

I believe that the .govs tech is 30-50 years ahead of whatever tech is available to the public.


LT we've got TONS of .gov contracts. I'm not saying that they aren't there tech wise, BUT they don't have the access to the stream, and the stream is the info, and depending on the stream or quality of the camera determines how useful the information is. My guess is that 90% of the cameras out there are first generation cameras, which kinda suck.

[Glass]

I've been delving into the home surviellance do it your self kind of deal. Cameras are cheap enough for indoors but the outdoor cameras are much more expensive. I don't like wireless so I have to cable them, I don't want RCA type cabling. I'd prefer IP/ethernet cabling.

I have a free control app for PC. It allows zones, can track people moving between cameras, can send alerts, run programs. It has a face rec plugin - have not tried, it has a number plate rec plugin - have not tried.

I need to get a couple of IR emitters to light up a few corners in the yard. Cameras with IR can't see through windows at night because the IR gets reflected. I can see my cams on my phone and my tablet as well as the PC's I use. Nothing professional and while I hate them in public I like having them for my self.

I could see me selling solutions like the ones you are talking about GoD. Need to learn a fair bit more though about things like FoV and the right camera selection.

[EE_]

FBI rolls out new facial recognition program

Civil rights group says database risks turning millions of citizens with no criminal record into suspects
September 15, 2014 4:53PM ET
by Renee Lewis

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) announced Monday the completion of its new facial recognition system, making operational a program that civil rights groups have warned risks turning millions of citizens with no criminal record into suspects.

Next Generation Identification (NGI), as the technology is known, was developed to expand the bureau’s biometric identification capabilities. Now, the NGI system will include automated fingerprint search capabilities, mobile fingerprint identification and electronic image storage, a press release by the FBI’s Criminal Justice Information Services Division said.

Whistle-blower Edward Snowden revealed in June that the National Security Agency (NSA) pulls in millions of images to aid its own facial recognition program.

The FBI's facial recognition service “will provide the nation’s law enforcement community with an investigative tool that provides an image-searching capability of photographs associated with criminal identities,” the FBI release said.

But civil liberties watchdog Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) said the system poses a threat to the privacy of all Americans, including those with no criminal history.

EFF filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit for information on NGI in April. FBI documents they obtained showed that the facial recognition component of the system could include as many as 52 million digital images of faces by 2015, the group said.

Up to 4.3 million pictures taken for non-criminal purposes will also be added to the database, documents obtained by EFF showed. Mug shots will be combined with non-criminal facial images taken from employment records and background check databases, technology news website The Verge reported Monday.

That means someone with no criminal history could be implicated as a suspect in a crime if an image of his or her face happens to be in the database, EFF warned.

Compounding that risk is the apparent ineffectiveness of the system, with some in the industry saying the image matching system has a low rate of success, according to The Verge report.

The FBI, for its part, has said the system is not designed to give accurate identification. Instead, it is meant to provide a list of candidates — saying that if the true candidate exists in the system, it will appear in the top 50 candidates returned by the system 85 percent of the time, according to documents obtained by the EFF.

“This means that many people will be presented as suspects for crimes they didn’t commit,” EFF said.

Al Jazeera's request for comment from the FBI was not answered at the time of publication.

Rights groups have also raised concerns over who has access to the images, which the FBI release only vaguely referred to.

“Law enforcement agencies, probation and parole officers, and other criminal justice entities will also greatly improve their effectiveness by being advised of subsequent criminal activity of persons under investigation or supervision,” the release said. “The IPS [Interstate Photo System] facial recognition service will provide the nation’s law enforcement community with an investigative tool that provides an image-searching capability of photographs associated with criminal identities.”

According to EFF, “the FBI and Congress have thus far failed to enact meaningful restrictions on what types of data can be submitted to the system, who can access the data, and how the data can be used.”

The FBI said in the documents it will not allow non-criminal photos like images from social networking sites into the system, but there are no legal restrictions to keep that from occurring at some point, EFF said.

http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/9/15/fbi-facial-recognition.html

[General of Darkness]

Like I said before. The technology is there, but I think this is scare tactics because at the end of the day you need the best cameras, BIG ASS MONEY, then you need bandwidth to send the stream to where the software is and the systems in place that all TALK TO EACH OTHER to cross reference it, and more importantly you need the right of way. And what I mean by that, the Feds don't have the access or legal right to put a camera in XYZ place.

As an example there are several manufacturers that provide the NVR software, and they're all proprietary, and they don't talk to each other. The feds would have to have access to the feeds before the NVR's, and I don't see that happening and in fact the opposite is happening these days. Cities are removing their cameras because they cost more than the revenue they generate.

[palani]

I recall a number of years ago I had 6 starlight cameras (motorola) valued at $20k each for plant security. The security chief wanted to test the system so he crept up on the plant after dark. The officer on duty at the plant noticed him with the camera and called the local police. The chief had some explaining to do.

Those things were state of the art for the late '70s but despite the heaters on the glass they still had dew problems and were a maintenance headache. The image orthicon was subject to burning if left stationary and recording technology didn't exist at the time.