Artificial intelligence: transforming business security strategies

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Artificial intelligence allows machines to do jobs previously done by people. When it comes to security and surveillance, this technology allows cameras and control room equipment to identify a wide range of threats automatically and in real time across hundreds or even thousands of cameras – allowing security teams to take immediate action to protect people and assets.

AI technology and surveillance solutions

Artificial Intelligence technology built into surveillance solutions help organisations optimise their security

Video surveillance cameras are the electronic eyes of any security operation. In the past, human supervision was needed to make sense of the images captured, and to assess whether certain events posed a security risk or not. With some organisations using hundreds or even thousands of cameras to protect their people and assets, manual review of footage is simply impossible – potentially leaving them vulnerable to security breaches.

Advanced Artificial Intelligence technology built into surveillance solutions can help organisations overcome this challenge and optimise their security. This means cameras, control-room equipment and back-end infrastructure can now ‘learn’ about potential threats for themselves by recognising people, vehicles and even behaviours.

Detection and prevention

The manual interventions needed with traditional security systems mean that teams were frequently reacting to breaches that had already happened. Artificial Intelligence changes all this by recognising potential threats before they impact company’s people or assets – allowing security teams to react immediately to neutralise any potential threat.

Artificial intelligence solutions can automatically trigger alerts when a person appears in a restricted area

For example, artificial Intelligence solutions can automatically trigger alerts when a person appears in a restricted area, or when a vehicle with a blacklisted number plate enters a site. With alerts delivered in real time, teams can identify and react to security threats and protect people and assets more effectively. And because alerts are automated, potential threats are hardly missed or overlooked.

How does artificial intelligence work?

Artificial Intelligence systems become more intelligent over time, building databases of potential threats and reacting to new events accordingly. This allows systems to ‘think for themselves’ and to alert teams of any suspicious events or people who are caught on camera.

Artificial intelligence technologies use advanced algorithms based on Deep Learning to distinguish between different kinds of security events and threats. Technologies incorporated into the Hikvision portfolio include:

Facial recognition which allows law enforcement personnel to identify suspects and commercial teams to identify VIP customers in real time.
Vehicle identification which can be used to identify vehicle number plates and recognise different types of vehicles (even down to make and model), or to trigger alerts when vehicles enter restricted areas.
Perimeter protection which helps organisations to identify real threats by distinguishing people and vehicles from other moving objects and keeping false alarms to a minimum.
Business intelligence which employs people counting, queue detection, and heat mapping technologies, so that organisations can enhance operational efficiency by making use of the data report.

Increasing commercial success

Artificial intelligence isn’t just useful for identifying security threats – although this is a key strength of the technology. It can also help organisations increase their competitiveness and commercial success.

For example, VIP customers who opt to participate in special marketing promotions or other incentives can be identified so staff can provide the right kind of service at the right time. This gives organisations the opportunity to personalise the service experience, foster loyalty and maximise customer lifetime revenues.

Artificial Intelligence can help organisations to better understand customers and meet their needs more effectively

In the same way, artificial Intelligence can help organisations to better understand customers and meet their needs more effectively – leading to more commercial opportunities. One feature – called People Counting – allows stores and commercial centres to map footfall at peak times, ensuring that staffing is optimised to meet demand. At the same time, stores can see which areas of the building customers visit most and adjust their merchandising and product positioning accordingly to maximise the sales opportunities.

Artificial intelligence at Hikvision

Hikvision’s family of artificial intelligence products include the DeepinView network cameras and DeepinMind NVRs. The products help to tackle security with facial recognition; monitoring and counting of people; and recognition and detection of vehicles, to name a few. These features all depend on artificial intelligence technology to recognise, classify and respond to security threats.

This article was written by Hikvision.

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