Year in review: Top 10 security industry expert panel discussions from 2017

SourceSecurity.com’s Expert Panel covered a lot of ground in 2017 about a variety of topics resonating in the security market.

The most-read Roundtable discussion in 2017 was about a familiar and ongoing debate: What is an open system? Other hot topics that made the Top-10 list of Roundtable discussions included smartphones, buzzwords, standards and product life cycles.

Here is a listing of our Top 10 Expert Panel Roundtable discussions posted in 2017, along with a “sound bite” from each discussion, and links back to the full articles.

Thanks to everyone who contributed to Expert Panel Roundtable in 2017 (including the quotable panelists named below).

1. What is an open system? Is there a consensus in the marketplace on the definition of “open?”

"Being truly ‘open’ means going above and beyond when designing your product line, keeping in mind the ability for end-users to easily interface your product with other open-platform solutions. That's why offering an open-platform design must be coupled with the ability to provide exceptional support through training, follow-up and innovation as they are brought to market.” [Mitchell Kane]

2. How are smartphones impacting the physical security market?

"The security protocols on phones (such as fingerprint readers and encryption) have become some of the strongest available to consumers and are regularly used to access essential services such as banking. With this level of trust and user convenience from mobile device security, it makes sense to produce physical security systems that also take advantage of it." [John Davies]

TDSi's John Davies says it makes sense to produce physical security systems that take advantage of trust and user convenience on mobile devices

3. What is the biggest missed opportunity of security systems integration?

"Integrators need to be more savvy on how they can meet their customers’ IT and surveillance goals, from both a technology and services perspective. Being knowledgeable about new innovations can help integrators sell infrastructure, keeping that piece of business rather than losing server sales to a customer’s internal IT department. Integrators are tasked with ensuring surveillance customers can benefit from best practices, and solutions proven in the world of IT offer significant benefit." [Brandon Reich]

4. What are the security industry’s newest buzzwords?

"End-to-End Security is a buzzword reflecting how cyber threats are increasing and the importance of ‘the security of security systems,’ especially for companies operating in the critical national infrastructure. Convergence has been a ‘hot topic’ for years, but has it really happened? In order to create true end-to-end security solutions, IT and physical security best practices need to be combined." [Arjan Bouter]

End-to-End Security is a buzzword reflecting how cyber threats are increasing, says Arjan Bouter

5. What technology will have the greatest impact in the second half of 2017?

"Cloud-hosted access control is poised to have the biggest impact in the second half of 2017. Organisations are looking to decentralise IT management and eliminate the need for overhead costs in hardware infrastructure and ongoing maintenance costs. This decentralisation is driving them to migrate their day-to-day systems to the cloud, and access control is no exception." [Melissa Stenger]

6. Are mergers and acquisitions good or bad for the security industry?

“On the ‘pro’ side, consolidation is good for pulling together a fractured market, as vendors try to gain market share by acquiring solutions they may not otherwise have in their portfolio. On the ‘con’ side, however, consolidation restricts or limits innovation as the merged vendors strive to develop end-to-end solutions that reduce customer choices" [Reinier Tuinzing]

7. What new standards are needed in the security marketplace?

"Do we need that many new standards, or do we need the industry to embrace the standards that are already in place? I believe that current standards like ONVIF and OSDP are sufficient in what they offer the industry. Members of the security industry just need to start thinking outside the box and realise that it is with standards in place that real industry growth can occur." [Per Björkdahl]

8. What will be the big news at ISC West 2017?

"Security solutions that capture greater data and utilise analytics to transform the data into useful information, or business intelligence, will be the talk of the industry at ISC West this year. It’s not just about surveillance or access control anymore, but about who can best assess the end user’s interests and deliver an end-to-end solution that provides a value beyond the technology and a service beyond security.” [Richard Brent]

When buying cameras, customers are often lured by lower upfront costs, but may end up paying more in the medium- to long-term because of lower quality, says Oncam's Jumbi Edulbehram

9. Why should a customer continue to buy “premium” surveillance cameras?

"When buying cameras, customers are often lured by lower upfront costs, but may end up paying more in the medium- to long-term because of lower quality (requiring costly site visits and replacements), susceptibility to cyber-attacks, or lower quality of integrations with video management systems. Customers should certainly be prudent buyers and make sure that they’re paying for actual reliability/features/functionality rather than simply paying a premium for a brand-name product. When functionality and reliability are important, it always makes sense to ‘buy nice, not twice.’ [Jumbi Edulbehram]

10. What is an acceptable life cycle for a physical security system?

"The answer to this question clearly depends on the seat you sit in. Manufacturers, integrators, distributors, consultants and engineers all have extremely different perspectives on this question. As a manufacturer, we design systems to have a lifecycle between 5 and 7 years." [Robert Lydic]