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Communication consultant & technology writer, NSPR

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Caroline Bullock is a communication consultant and technology writer with a passion for unearthing the business issues and human interest angle. With a journalism career that has included stints as a business editor of a regional broadsheet and editor of a national transport publication, she has driven the news agenda for a wide range of publications. More recently she has focused on content strategy for a variety of sectors and major brands as well as indulging another journalist passion – food and restaurant writing, with her articles appearing in the Independent, Telegraph and Delicious magazine.
August 3, 2015

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Social Housing, CCTV and Cloud Storage: Challenging the Myths About IP Video Surveillance

social housing 2Traditionally, most debates around CCTV have tended to be fairly simplistic, pitting the merits of its very existence against accusations of overzealous ‘big brother’ intrusiveness.

But exponential growth and six million cameras nationwide later we’re accustomed to living our lives under a lens and the dialogue has shifted towards the specific technology behind it, namely digital versus analogue.

And fuelled by the explosion of cloud-based surveillance, the new breed of cameras are better equipped than ever to remedy some of the long-standing cost and efficiency issues that have blighted the performance of their analogue counterparts.

It’s an issue that has garnered further attention more recently in the wake of the high profile Hatton Garden raid. Here, the limitations of older CCTV systems were exposed, chiefly susceptibility to tampering and vandalism with thieves disabling the camera and removing the hard drives containing footage from an on-premises digital video recorder.

A cloud-based alternative with capabilities for remote monitoring would have rendered such a move impossible with real-time footage stored and secured in a remote data centre. Furthermore, the required imagery would have been available to the police within minutes rather than almost a week after the incident as happened in this case.

In theory it’s the kind of development that should render older style systems obsolete. Yet for those still firmly attached to their analogue counterparts there is some convincing to do.

Explode the myth

A notable example is the social housing sector where loyalty to the traditional systems has long prevailed, largely down to that mantra of ‘better the devil you know’.

It’s a mindset that James Wickes, founder and CEO of Cloudview, the world’s first corporate grade cloud-based surveillance solution, is still on a mission to address. Specifically he is determined to explode the myth that digital means complex as evidenced by his own solution.

Through a simple plug and play piece of hardware, a visual network adapter connects limitless number of cameras to Cloudview’s cloud-based image management system and ensures authorised users have fast and easy access to footage whenever they want.

And he has identified social housing as an area ripe for this largely untapped potential in terms of cost savings, accessibility and flexibility.

Having teamed up with the publisher of Housing Technology magazine, George Grant, the pair have launched the first industry report of its kind to explore the benefits that cloud-based surveillance can offer to this market, highlighting the capabilities of the cloud for this sector’s often challenging and complex security needs.

As well as the nuts and bolts of crime prevention and tackling antisocial behaviour, the report further considers the potential for a broader use of the technology such as monitoring physical assets from when bins need emptying to the general state of communal areas.

Informed by a wealth of industry expert commentary, the findings have gathered substantial intelligence to build a strong case for wider adoption of cloud-based security in this arena, citing the cheaper installation costs and capabilities to produce real time, high quality and crucially easily accessible footage.

Recurring themes

By contrast, the report argues that the costly installation and low quality recorded footage of the traditional analogue systems along with their tendency to be vandalised are simply no longer fit for purpose in an era of the internet of things, IP-enabled devices and the increasingly omnipresent smartphone and tablet.

“Among the issues affecting housing providers, antisocial behaviour, crime and security are recurring themes,” said Wickes.

“The ability to upgrade existing CCTV or install new systems or cameras that combine value for money with easy access to footage via the internet, means that housing providers can respond faster and more cost-effectively to any incidents.”

Indeed the potential is already being realised by the experience of national housing provider, Accent Group, which has recently begun to use Cloudview and has plans to roll out the system across all of its key sites.

Prior to switching to the cloud-based solution and in common with many of their peers, their deployed surveillance comprised little more than a jumbled assortment of incompatible cameras. Footage was recorded onto local hard drives which once downloaded was often too poor quality to use as hard evidence.

Furthermore, a contractor would have to be called out at around £100 a time to retrieve the footage which in turn incurs additional costs when every penny counts.

Using a single visual surveillance solution which is easier to install and manage across Accent’s multiple sites ensures authorised users have quick and easy access to high quality footage whenever they want.

Wickes added: “It’s been fascinating to work with a number of housing providers to deliver visual surveillance networks that they can use on a day-to-day basis for the good of their tenants and it’s all possible because of the advent of the internet and cloud computing that has enabled a step change in the industry.”

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SimonLambertConsultant
August 28, 2015 6:54 pm

Being sufficiently riled by many of the assertions here, I feel driven to be reply. Anyone who is concerned about the difference between ‘digital’ and ‘analogue’ is wasting their energy. Use the most appropriate to meet your purposes. Don’t worry what others are doing. They might be idiots who are easily misled. I have yet to have explained to me by cloud proponents how anything but a hugely fast uplink (thereby expensive and fallible) from their client’s premises can give high-quality, real-time footage from many cameras. Video compression is the quality killer. Pretty much all analogue CCTV has been recorded… Read more »

James Wickes
September 23, 2015 4:22 pm

SimonLambertConsultant “Being sufficiently riled by many of the assertions here, I feel driven to be reply.” The Cloud” has irreversibly entered the security lexicon and it’s a good thing to have a grown up debate about the use of cloud services as a component in security systems. “Anyone who is concerned about the difference between ‘digital’ and ‘analogue’ is wasting their energy. Use the most appropriate to meet your purposes. Don’t worry what others are doing. They might be idiots who are easily misled.” I’m sure that everyone wants to understand the differences between the various technologies involved so they… Read more »

SimonLambertConsultant
September 24, 2015 7:45 pm

James Wickes SimonLambertConsultant Hi James, thanks for taking take to reply at length. The number of points we’ve both raised here risks each reply turning into a tract to rival ‘War & Peace’ 😉  I agree with many of your philosophies above. A couple of my points to clarify: – Folk researching purchases are not necessarily idiots. But idiots research too.   So do your own, and don’t concern yourself with what other people have concluded. – Internal staff retrieving footage does not increase costs if salaried (even overtime <£100). I agree cloud options should be considered in an open-minded way.… Read more »

James Wickes
September 25, 2015 3:21 pm

Hi Simon, Thank you. I see your point on costs and I think we are agreed that there is a below the line cost as well as an inconvenience factor associated with the use of internal staff for footage retrieval. Taking your example, a standard broadband connection would support a convenience store with 8 cameras if Cloudview was the service of choice. I would add that the more bandwidth available the better the user experience. (A standard broadband connection should be able to offer a 2Mbit uplink, this is sufficient for 8 cameras to capture events to Cloudview’s servers, a… Read more »