Surveillance industry poised for considerable change
Firas Jadalla, Regional Director for the Middle East, Turkey and Africa at Genetec elaborates on the future of the surveillance industry
How do you view the surveillance industry of Middle East?
In the Middle East, the surveillance industry has seen considerable growth. As the metropolitan cities in the region, such as in the UAE and Saudi Arabia focus on developing new infrastructure projects, such as transport networks, residential projects, shopping malls and other commercial projects, governments and organizations are increasingly adopting advanced surveillance solutions. These solutions can range from IP Video surveillance to advanced video analytics solutions as well.
Additionally, to align with smart cities initiatives, for example, Smart Dubai 2021, governments are placing a strong emphasis on safety and security. Furthermore, as the region’s construction industry and tourism and hospitality sector boom, the demand for sophisticated surveillance solutions is expected to rise as well.
How has COVID 19 pandemic changed the surveillance industry
The surveillance industry has seen significant developments and new technologies in light of the pandemic. COVID-19 has led to an increased demand and adoption of surveillance solutions for monitoring physical facilities, temperature detection, and contact tracing, among many other applications. In order to curb the spread of the virus, social distancing measures were adopted and enforced worldwide. To comply with these practices while re-opening their facilities, and protect the safety of the public, many governments, retailers, and organizations sought surveillance solutions that can monitor occupancy levels to ensure compliance to social distancing regulations. We have observed that, video surveillance solutions can provide much more than just live video feeds or recorded footage.
These can now be integrated as part of a unified surveillance system, which collects data that can be turned into actionable insights. By adopting surveillance solutions such as occupancy management solutions, organizations can count, visualize, and alert employees about occupancy limits and empower them to react and take necessary actions to enforce safety guidelines.
What are some of the major futuristic solutions Genetec provides?
Genetec provides comprehensive security solutions to enable organizations to work smarter, expand their security capabilities, while also increasing their operational efficiency.
Security Center Omnicast is one such solution. Omnicast is an IP video management solution (VMS) that gives organizations a clear picture of events and empowers them to quickly react to threats. The system scales with enterprise needs and lets them take advantage of the latest hardware and analytics technologies. With a smarter approach to video, enterprise operations and security improve over time, helping them to make better, more informed decisions. These solutions are aimed at making enterprises future ready as they automate security, capture reliable and usable evidence, and helps organizations understand their environment better.
Additionally, Genetec Stratocast brings cloud-based video monitoring to simplify surveillance. Stratocast lets users view live and recorded video from their laptop, tablet, or smartphone. The service is easy to install, requires minimal upkeep and helps secure user data so you know your business is safe, and your operations are running smoothly, wherever you are. This means organizations benefit from having less hardware to manage and lower upfront costs. All communications are encrypted from the camera to the cloud. Since the video is stored in the cloud, it’s safe against hardware defects, theft, and vandalism.
Genetec is committed to empower organizations to enhance their security and is constantly innovating and bringing forward-thinking technologies to advance the future of surveillance.
What do you think is the future of surveillance?
The surveillance industry is poised for considerable change as we navigate the new reality of a post-pandemic world. The occupancy management solutions adopted during the pandemic allow organizations to leverage spatial insights and understand visitors’ behavior in their facilities. These insights can empower organizations to adapt their services to enhance visitors’ experiences.
Additionally, as organizations deal with excessive surveillance data, video analytics will be increasingly implemented to strengthen site security and deliver smarter insights. Video analytics will empower organizations to automate video surveillance and enable them to work smarter and take quicker actions as they receive real-time notifications about security data. In addition, as they adopt new surveillance solutions, governments and businesses will prioritize privacy protection. Out-of-date hardware, insecure cameras, or unencrypted communications between a client and server application, are all vulnerable to cyberattacks. Therefore, organizations will realize the importance of adopting a unified platform that utilizes multi-factor authentication, encryption, and authorization and protects their security systems against both physical and cyberthreats.
