How are wearable technologies impacting the security market?

The types of wearables are increasing exponentially with no sign of slowing down. There are unlimited types of wearables available, all engineered in vastly different ways, with different security and privacy capabilities. Increasingly, more wearables run on System on Chip (SoC) technologies, which integrate many different functions into a tiny chip. This, very simply put, makes a wearable mainframe on a person’s body. The more wearables you have and the more mainframes you carry around, the more ways you can be targeted and have security risks exploited. This impacts the security market because traditional security products are not engineered and do not have the capabilities to identify, mitigate, and effectively block all the risks that wearables bring. Security manufacturers who want to gain a market share from those using wearables need to either update their solutions to address these new types of risks or find other manufacturers of security solutions for components of wearables that they can partner with and integrate within their solutions to fill these gaps in security and privacy protections.

While wearable technology such as body-worn cameras (BWC) has traditionally been utilised by law enforcement, BWC video has a growing number of potential applications in the private and enterprise security sectors. In areas such as education, large venue events, and retail, good-quality video and audio can be fundamental to capturing unusual behaviour that may not be immediately obvious from fixed camera vantage points. Many benefits overlap with the experiences in law enforcement, e.g., training, policy enforcement, liability protection, rapid dispute resolution, live streaming w/remote assist, transparency, and potentially improved customer/public behaviour. For private security in particular, the portable/mobile nature of BWCs improves the ability of on-site security personnel to report and/or document their observations for follow-up by management or facilities staff. In an age where cell phone videos are ever present but often taken out of context, BWCs are an effective tool that provides unique perspectives to supplement traditional video cameras.

The adoption rate of wearables – specifically body worn cameras – is exploding in the non-law enforcement sector, and today is used by everyone from security officers and service personnel to delivery drivers and healthcare personnel. The technology in this area is growing by leaps and bounds, particularly when you take into account other mobile cameras such as dashboard cameras in vehicles. This is an area with high connectivity requirements, for both live streaming and recording/docking scenarios, and we should expect to see new advancements in mobile surveillance be introduced that can benefit the rest of the surveillance market.

Wearable technologies offer many benefits but pose unique security challenges requiring robust controls and for users to keep their devices updated. These devices collect large amounts of personal data, such as health metrics and location information. As a result, manufacturers should implement robust encryption, provide frequent updates, and establish transparent data policies that maintain compliance with Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and California’s Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA). Similarly, consumers should request stronger security controls from manufacturers, and should regularly update software, use strong passwords, and monitor app permissions.