'India moving towards IP-based surveillance environment'

16 Mar 09

The proliferation of the internet as a means of communication has enabled the use of the web browser in web-surveillance technology.

“There is a paradigm shift taking place in the web (IP) based surveillance market in India. The industry is moving from CCTV environment to web based surveillance system,” said Mano Kanthanathan, vice president, BSW Soft Pvt. Ltd, a leading solution provider of web-based surveillance in India.

Kanthanathan stated that web-based surveillance enables personnel from all aspects of a business to be involved in monitoring the workplace in real time and has changed the way monitoring is being conducted and carried out.

“One of the key factors enabling this growth is the proliferation of internet as a means of communication in the workplace, which has enabled the use of a web browser in web surveillance technology. We can, therefore, view incidents in real time or examine events that have occurred in the past in a distant location,” said Kanthanathan.

Enhancing possibilities

Web-surveillance technology further enhances the possibilities of routing information immediately, facilitating action to be taken when the situation demands it. Furthermore, this technology stores video images in a database, enabling investigations to be carried out and evidence to be studied in a video, instead of relying on less reliable data.

Manoj Soni, CEO, BSW Soft Pvt. Ltd. added that, “Web-based surveillance is a new benefit derived from the widespread use of the internet with developments occurring daily in IP camera, video compression, browser, and software technology, respectively.

In this regard, BSW Soft has bagged a huge order from a large retail chain to install nearly 900 cameras. “The retail chain intends to implement cameras in all their outlets so that they can observe the behaviour of their customers towards their products. They plan to use information gathered from this in order to understand the customer, and position their products more effectively so that it reaches the target audience,” said Soni.

“This requirement was not meant for surveillance purpose; rather it is to be implemented as a business process that will enable the head office business analysts to be able to observe the customer directly without having to have a feedback from the store.

“They would also use the information gathered by this system to understand the success or failure of various promotions that they have. Information gathered will also be able to provide statistics on product preferences and enable business analysts to understand why a particular product is or not in demand. This will also enable head office to track the number of people coming to the store as well as its different areas. Soni added.

Recently, BSW Soft in partnership with ACTi provided an IP surveillance solution using ACTi NVR Proffessional Software for the high profile Aero India air show that took place in February this year in Bangalore.