Santos, Brazil plays it safe with Bosch video monitoring

Santos is not only home to Brazil’s biggest seaport, it is also short for Santos Futebol Clube, the football club where in 1956 one of the most famous football players in history, Pelé, started his career. However, not only football fans come to visit this beautiful city, also tourists from all around the world are attracted by the famous beaches of Santos.

The city and the seaside of Santos are now much safer than just a few years ago, when street crime was on the rise. To fight crime, the city of Santos installed six Bosch video security cameras for operation during the summer season along the beaches in 2005. The video surveillance had an immediate effect in catching thieves in flagrante delicto and stopping robbers.

Encouraged by the success of the video monitoring, the city has been continuously extending the network of Bosch video cameras and has recently decided to buy another 36 cameras for beach surveillance. This will raise the total number of Bosch video security cameras installed in Santos to 700 by the end of 2016. The cameras in use consist of fixed cameras, license plate recognition cameras, moving AUTODOME IP cameras, and cameras with built-in video analytics.

The monitoring and surveillance is now not only used to protect tourists but also residents and to increase the general security in the city. The cameras are used by fire brigades to detect fires and by the police to monitor traffic. The license plate recognition cameras are being used to keep an overview overall vehicles entering and leaving the city.

Robbery and burglary rates in Santos continue to fall. In the first nine months of 2016, thefts decreased by 9.8 percent compared to the same period in the previous year. “Deterrence is one of the main purposes of the video cameras,” says Sérgio Del Brel, Municipal Security Secretary. “The cameras also help by providing images that can be used as evidence in criminal suits.”