SCADA, Telematics & GPS Technologies

The United Kingdom has the most surveillance cameras per capita in the world. With the recent news that CCTV cameras do not actually deter crime, how can the local town councils justify the massive surveillance program? By going after pooping dogs.

In a recent interview with The Guardian, the head of the Metropolitan Police’s Visual Images Office explained the failings of CCTV:

“Billions of pounds has been spent on it, but no thought has gone into how the police are going to use the images and how they will be used in court. It’s been an utter fiasco: only 3 percent of crimes were solved by CCTV. There’s no fear of CCTV. Why don’t people fear it? (They think) the cameras are not working.”

Conjuring up the bogeymen of terrorists, online pedophiles and cybercriminals, the U.K. passed a comprehensive surveillance law, The Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act, in 2000. The law allows “the interception of communications, carrying out of surveillance, and the use of covert human intelligence sources” to help prevent crime, including terrorism.

Recent reports in the U.K. media indicate that the laws are being used for everything but terrorism investigations:

• Derby City Council, Bolton, Gateshead, and Hartlepool used surveillance to investigate dog fouling.
• Bolton Council also used the act to investigate littering.
• The London borough of Kensington and Chelsea conducted surveillance on the misuse of a disabled parking pass.
• Liverpool City Council used Ripa to identify a false claim for damages.
• Conwy

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I’ve no ideas of what keep on happening around us. I do feel so insecure nowadays, due to increasing of crime rate. With crime on the rise many people and business are looking for added security. Video surveillance is one the top ways to improve the security of your belongings and loved ones. I get asked alot about what is good or recommended and although each situation is different there are some common things to consider when showing a video surveillance system that will bring the required results.

You have two basic kinds of video surveillance cameras, there are the CCTV cameras, which are what you see most often right now. They are the cameras that are connected to a DVR or VCR, they usually have a coax type cable (rg59) and a power cable to power the camera leading from the dvr to the camera. You have many different styles, but the most common are the dome cameras or the box cameras. They both do the same thing, they are just in different enclosures. You also have the pan, tilt, zoom cameras that are normally in domes but you can control the camera position via a joystick or through software on your computer.

The other type of video surveillance camera are the network cameras, or IP cameras as some call them. They are the latest technology to come along in the video surveillance industry. Network cameras are generally what I recommend because of their advanced features, such as email notifications, remote viewing, can use a pc to view and operate, ease of installation, and exceptional picture quality with the megapixel cameras. The ip cameras can be installed using a single cat5 or cat6 network cable, most of the network cameras are poe (power over ethernet) ready, which means that the power and video can be carried over the same line, which is a huge money saver compared to a cctv system, a poe injector or a poe switch is needed on the backend to power the cameras. Another advantage of this type of system is you can have mulitple cameras coming from the switch and you can the switch plugged into a UPS (battery backup) so if you ever have a power outtage, the cameras will keep running and recording.

A network camera has software built into the camera that allows you to change setting such as color setting, motion sensor areas, email settings and so on. One of the biggest selling points of a network camera is that they can be viewed online from any computer that has an internet connection and all you need is your standard browser, like internet explorer. Software is also available, such as Milestone Systems, that allows you to setup multiple cameras from any location and view them all on the same screen. Read the rest of this article