Although Apple faced a major PR incident when it revealed its Face ID unlocking feature for the iPhone X, industry experts remain confident that the technology behind the feature will change the game and be here to stay. The system, infrared powered facial recognition, unlocks the phone and performs several other functions as well.
Facial recognition is increasingly popular, especially in China. Megvii Inc. is a Chinese facial recognition startup that through the Chinese and Russian governments and investors raised over $460 million to develop enhanced facial recognition for government use. In an inversion of usual trends, the technology is really still just emerging in the West even as it explodes in Asia. In the East these systems are already quite well established and are used by everything from state security forces in India and China to commercial banks, restaurants, and stores. In some stores in China, you simply take what items you want out of the store and a facial recognition system automatically debits your account for your items. The technology sees extensive use by the police, who have AR glasses which perform facial recognition and project information onto what the user sees in the physical world.
Security
Here in the West we still hold on to the idea that to some extent privacy is a natural right, and therefore are more sensitive to infringements of that privacy. In China, face scanning has become the norm for things like accessing buildings, buying tickets, travel and more. Situations where we are still using RFID or other forms of identification are now primarily handled in this way. In fact, “a recent article in the South China Morning Post [said], the Chinese government has been working on a system since 2015 which it claims can use CCTV surveillance cameras to identify any one of China’s 1.3 billion people within three seconds — and with at least 88 percent accuracy.” (securitytoday.com)
Before this, during the 2013 Youth Games at Nanjing, police monitored 13 stadiums and their surroundings using an IoT network powered by Chinese company Huawei. This was linked to CCTV systems, drones, and cameras mounted on vehicles. Now with the added factor of AI face recognition software, experts believe that with improvement this could create a collective or collaborative security.
At home
“As IoT connected ‘smart homes’ become more and more common, we are likely to see a number of facial recognition applications emerge. One of the most obvious will be in the field of home security. People are more concerned about security than ever before, and home security systems account for an estimated $47 billion in global sales annually.” (securitytoday.com)
As in the previous case we looked at in China, collaborative security networks can be developed throughout interconnected neighborhoods. Facial recognition can ID strangers to an area or home, alert neighbors, and signal security or law enforcement. This technology can also notify during emergencies of other types and even provide some monitoring for children and the elderly.
In a commercial setting
Like we already looked at, facial recognition is becoming the standard in the East in places such as China and India for things as commonplace as setting up bank accounts or even entering public restrooms. We are already seeing this spread West. As many as 25 percent of stores in the UK were using this kind of software as far back as 2015.
These systems were originally to catch shoplifters, but is now used increasingly to verify identity in high end stores and banks. “In Hangzhou [China], Alibaba has launched a ‘smile to pay’ function in KFC restaurants, designed to attract younger, tech-savvy customers and reduce waiting time and staff demands through automation.” (securitytoday.com) These are the kinds of things we should expect to see in the coming years in the U.S. as far as this technology goes. What’s more, this data will be amassed and used as “big data”, processed and used in algorithms to predict customer behavior based on things like body language, facial expressions, and time spent in different parts of a store. Soon we will have no real way of knowing what information is being gathered about us and what is being done with it.
Please contact us through email at admin@gostst.com on our website or via phone at 210-446-4863 24/7 to schedule a consultation.
Source: securitytoday.com
How Facial Recognition Will Affect Our Daily Lives
/in Security General, Smart Security /by Evan YoungmanAlthough Apple faced a major PR incident when it revealed its Face ID unlocking feature for the iPhone X, industry experts remain confident that the technology behind the feature will change the game and be here to stay. The system, infrared powered facial recognition, unlocks the phone and performs several other functions as well.
Facial recognition is increasingly popular, especially in China. Megvii Inc. is a Chinese facial recognition startup that through the Chinese and Russian governments and investors raised over $460 million to develop enhanced facial recognition for government use. In an inversion of usual trends, the technology is really still just emerging in the West even as it explodes in Asia. In the East these systems are already quite well established and are used by everything from state security forces in India and China to commercial banks, restaurants, and stores. In some stores in China, you simply take what items you want out of the store and a facial recognition system automatically debits your account for your items. The technology sees extensive use by the police, who have AR glasses which perform facial recognition and project information onto what the user sees in the physical world.
Security
Here in the West we still hold on to the idea that to some extent privacy is a natural right, and therefore are more sensitive to infringements of that privacy. In China, face scanning has become the norm for things like accessing buildings, buying tickets, travel and more. Situations where we are still using RFID or other forms of identification are now primarily handled in this way. In fact, “a recent article in the South China Morning Post [said], the Chinese government has been working on a system since 2015 which it claims can use CCTV surveillance cameras to identify any one of China’s 1.3 billion people within three seconds — and with at least 88 percent accuracy.” (securitytoday.com)
Before this, during the 2013 Youth Games at Nanjing, police monitored 13 stadiums and their surroundings using an IoT network powered by Chinese company Huawei. This was linked to CCTV systems, drones, and cameras mounted on vehicles. Now with the added factor of AI face recognition software, experts believe that with improvement this could create a collective or collaborative security.
At home
“As IoT connected ‘smart homes’ become more and more common, we are likely to see a number of facial recognition applications emerge. One of the most obvious will be in the field of home security. People are more concerned about security than ever before, and home security systems account for an estimated $47 billion in global sales annually.” (securitytoday.com)
As in the previous case we looked at in China, collaborative security networks can be developed throughout interconnected neighborhoods. Facial recognition can ID strangers to an area or home, alert neighbors, and signal security or law enforcement. This technology can also notify during emergencies of other types and even provide some monitoring for children and the elderly.
In a commercial setting
Like we already looked at, facial recognition is becoming the standard in the East in places such as China and India for things as commonplace as setting up bank accounts or even entering public restrooms. We are already seeing this spread West. As many as 25 percent of stores in the UK were using this kind of software as far back as 2015.
These systems were originally to catch shoplifters, but is now used increasingly to verify identity in high end stores and banks. “In Hangzhou [China], Alibaba has launched a ‘smile to pay’ function in KFC restaurants, designed to attract younger, tech-savvy customers and reduce waiting time and staff demands through automation.” (securitytoday.com) These are the kinds of things we should expect to see in the coming years in the U.S. as far as this technology goes. What’s more, this data will be amassed and used as “big data”, processed and used in algorithms to predict customer behavior based on things like body language, facial expressions, and time spent in different parts of a store. Soon we will have no real way of knowing what information is being gathered about us and what is being done with it.
Please contact us through email at admin@gostst.com on our website or via phone at 210-446-4863 24/7 to schedule a consultation.
Source: securitytoday.com
Security in the Age of the IoT
/in Security General, Smart Security /by Evan YoungmanIt is certainly no secret that cybersecurity is ever increasingly a focal point for security professionals. It is now no longer on the periphery and is of serious concern in the video surveillance market. Because of this blurring of the lines between hardware and the digital realm (cloud), a competent security integrator needs to have a team that understands the interplay between the two and can make the best design decisions possible.
Hackers have known for quite some time that video surveillance cameras are some of the easiest to breach pieces of internet connected tech out there. Indeed, there are entire websites devoted to indexing the IPs of unsecured cameras and access control systems around the world. People are going online, without any technical skill, and doing things like turning the lights on and off in stadiums and spying on people though the camera they have placed in their living room.
But many security integrators and dealers lag behind in this area. Although manufactures can be relied on to a point, having at least one member of the team with the know-how to encrypt drives and understand authentication applications is a must. For example, two-factor authentication, now coming standard on some servers, uses “two PIN codes added to [a] Windows Server login — one as a primary password, the other a randomized PIN generated by [a] paired smartphone app, giving integrators an added layer of security”. ( www.sdmmag.com )
Being able to link a system to a two-step authentication through a specific cell number is a pretty strong defense against hackers, who traditionally access these systems through manufacturer back doors, “zero-day” exploits, or simply by using “packet sniffing” programs to watch your traffic and pull the IP and MAC address on your devices.
The prevailing opinion online seems to be that those dealers/integrators who do not keep up with this virtual counterpart to the physical systems they install will risk putting in systems that could be compromised and even lost to hackers. As the IoT expands and proliferates there will be many more individual possible weak points to conduct a security breach against in a network. STST makes use of a wide array of IoT-like devices already, as do many other companies and industries. Mobile connections can be used as backups for hard-wired connections in security solutions but are more critical when a system needs to include 24/7 personal video and control access to a user or users wherever they are. The security industry in general is likely to become increasingly centered around the usefulness and convenience of mobile communication tech, as many of us certainly seem to be already with our personal and social lives.
Security Technology of South Texas is happy to offer custom access control and surveillance solutions with video analytics to the greater South Texas area, designed either turn-key and from the ground up, or integrated into an already existing series of cameras.
Please contact us through email at admin@gostst.com on our website or via phone at 210-446-4863 24/7 to schedule a consultation.
Healthcare Cyber Security Challenges
/in Healthcare, Uncategorized /by Evan YoungmanHealthcare institutions already face a variety of security challenges both physically and in the digital space, and these of course will only continue to evolve. As this happens, the security industries must keep up with change. Particularly vulnerable to data breaches and ransomware are hospitals. This is due in part to the relatively high value of medical data. Besides this, most modern facilities and doctors now use electronic prescriptions which can be vulnerable to fraud and theft. Hospital administrators are under the pressures of a cost only alleviated through the improvement of operational security and workflow efficiency. Here we will look at some ways to accomplish that.
A key component in overall healthcare securities is knowing who is going where and when within the different zones of the installation. One way to accomplish this is using “Trusted Identities”. This approach to identity and authentication uses multi-factor authentication, digital certificates, management of credentials, and physical security in a four-pointed approach sometimes called PIAM. Reliable and efficient credential verification has given rise to a more connected and efficient system for hospitals in what is called the IoTT (Internet of Trusted Things). This also opens the door to making use of big data and machine learning to create fundamental changes in how healthcare institutions manage risk and operate in general.
Regarding electronic prescriptions, the DEA mandate for a separate two factor authentication for controlled substances is one out of many regulatory requirements facing the digital arm of healthcare. Intelligent systems built to automate much of this type of “red tape” can realize significant decreases in cost. Using integrated systems that can talk to each other will almost always result in better efficiency, done properly. Digital certificates, signatures and signing are backed by public key infrastructure and can incorporate One Time Password (OTP) tokens and biometrics to comply with both DEA and HIPAA. These same systems can be used to solve the fundamental issues of protecting patient data and remotely authenticating through VPNs using mobile devices.
Perhaps the most promising up and coming weapon in fighting healthcare fraud like malware and data breaches is real-time risk profiling, which protects against both known and recent threats targeting both online users and mobile devices. Risk profiling in the healthcare setting can use a wide variety of known information to make best guesses about a subject trying to gain access to some device in the network. These data driven cyber surveillance systems combine evidence-based approaches to risk analysis with behavioral biometrics to give the best picture of the real risks to an institution, much in the same way big retail chains can guess who is about to steal from a store.
Security Technology of South Texas is happy to offer custom access control and surveillance solutions to the healthcare market, designed either turn-key and from the ground up, or integrated into an already existing series of cameras.
Please contact us through email at admin@gostst.com on our website or via phone at 210-446-4863 24/7 to schedule a consultation.
The Future of Smart Video Systems
/in Security General, Smart Security /by Evan YoungmanEven though huge volumes of video data are collected every day, most statistics indicate that only 10 percent of this data is ever used. The majority of data collected loses its value very quickly after being generated. The reason for this? Our primary focus tends to be delivering the correct information in a crisis or providing it as evidence after criminal activity has taken place. This causes much data to be “wasted” in the sense that we lose our on the opportunity to perform useful analytics.
Video analytics is an increasingly powerful tool. It helps to improve usability of these vast amounts of video information. Analytics software acts as the “brain” of a surveillance system and is built into IP cameras themselves or processed in separate computing infrastructure. This creates a smarter system that “knows” what it sees and alerts guards to potential threats as soon as an alarm rule or condition is met. Analytics gives operators the chance to act faster and more efficiently with better intel.
Video analytics is like an ever-vigilant system operator within the security system itself. It captures data like a panopticon, seeing all in every monitored scene around the clock. Content analysis information, a form of video metadata, is stored as well. As they reduce operating costs and increase efficiency, intelligent cameras deliver a solid return on investment which can be measured in tangible results to the business or other setting in which it operates.
Let’s take a look at what exactly is possible using intelligent video. Smart IP cameras are able to classify the objects they see on their own. Objects entering or leaving the scene can be identified as a person, car, bike, truck, or other object. Because the camera can differentiate objects, it can be told to only alert in the case of a break-in, ignoring things like leaves in the wind or animals wondering through. New low-light cameras allow color-filtering even in scenes with very little ambient light. Even at night, color detection is possible in this way.
Alarm detection can be set to be even more specialized. Rules can be configured to look for specialized behavior patterns such as fighting, running, loitering, path following, abandoned luggage, entering an area, and more. The alarm engine in each camera coordinates with the others in a logical way to interpret this information and determine threat status. All this allows for a very robust alarm condition solution and prevents false and missed alarms.
What’s more, stored metadata enables forensic analysis at a later time. This means that retroactive searches for a specific car or person is possible even if it was not a determined item of interest until well after the event was recorded. Metadata is compact and only barely adds to the size of recordings. It is quick and easy to search through to find a specific event.
The logical next step is to continue to improve analytics for video metadata until we approach 100 percent practical use. Predictive analysis of human traffic patterns can predict shoplifting and identify potential events before they take place, and the more data that can be made useful the more accurate these types of predictions will be. The same technology can monitor customer dwell time at different displays in a store and determine the effectiveness of in-store advertising and product locations. Analyzing customer engagement with these displays can help increase customer engagement with products and lead to increased sales and revenue. As the IoT expands, this type of technology will be more and more critical as there will be many more points of data to analyze. There is no way to fully anticipate the eventual effects this will have on our industry or the world at large.
Security Technology of South Texas is happy to offer custom access control and surveillance solutions with video analytics to the retail and other markets, designed either turn-key and from the ground up, or integrated into an already existing series of cameras.
Please contact us through email at admin@gostst.com on our website or via phone at 210-446-4863 24/7 to schedule a consultation.