The choice of surveillance cameras comes at a price, what risk can your security system have?

Set up a reliable network video surveillance system, robust and quality depends entirely on devices that actually meet these requirements, as Sergio Fukushima analyses, Axis Communications Technical Manager for South America.

This year, Axis lost a project of more than three hundred cameras for road use. In a matter of weeks, the vast majority of installed devices had water infiltration, so it has been necessary to count the expenses associated with the workforce of the integrator for the replacement of the cameras and add the costs linked to the downtime of the equipment.

The fragility of a video surveillance system can be physical, as in this case, or software, such as vulnerabilities that can facilitate unauthorized access. Worse than water entering a chamber may be the entrance of a hacker, and the perception of risk usually only occurs when the purchase decision has already been made, the project has already been installed and integrated, and the problem has already been escalated.

The plurality of manufacturers in the professional video surveillance market has motivated the IT and security teams of customers to carry out a different decision process than the one practiced a few years ago.: it is no longer enough for him to put the specifications of his product on paper, rather, the so-called proof of concept has become increasingly common., according to which the customer installs the cameras in a real situation for a period of time to guarantee for himself the performance of the equipment before choosing the brand and thus verify if what the manufacturer says corresponds to the facts.

Although this reduces the risk of failures in the project after making the investment, the reality is that every decision involves difficulties. Choosing one or the other brand determines the degree of risk that the client is willing to assume., considering the reputation of its competitors, guarantees, the availability and agility of technical support, the history of other customers, investments in means to protect the system against cyberattacks perpetrated by private groups and government agencies, among other indicators.

There is also a risk of finding entire batches with serious failures.. In some cases, the problem makes the images not useful for viewing. Although any manufacturer is theoretically subject to these failures., it is essential to adopt a rigorous quality control process to reduce this possibility.

When the camera reaches the customer's hands and leaves the box, must work perfectly. To ensure that no error goes unnoticed, products must be tested automatically and manually, including high-pressure waterjet testing, strong impacts against the camera and hours and hours of continuous vibration.

In this sense, a product only has its continuous development in Axis after going through the sieve of a technical team that evaluates various elements, among them the image quality. But in addition to the price paid by the customer, each choice also has implications for the environment.

Based on Axis audited data, more than 85% of all your network video cameras and encoders are PVC-free, a material that has a negative impact on nature. Some devices have a much lower power consumption than a Les lamp, and all this must be valued thinking about tomorrow.

By spending more time analyzing these factors before making a purchase, less time will be spent on these aspects after making the investment. The involvement of manufacturers with seemingly similar proposals really requires a detailed and judicious decision process on the part of customers., and to be directly involved in the election and assert its interests. In the end, it is also he who will pay more expensive consequences.

Sergio Fukushima

Technical Manager of Axis Communications for South America

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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