Video surveillance cameras are increasing in numbers across the globe, capturing more and more footages every second. But such continuous recording of video doesn’t benefit the users unless the video is ‘audited’, according to Gautam Goradia, CEO and MD of India-based Hayagriva Software. The company’s product Com-s
Video surveillance cameras are increasing in numbers across the globe, capturing more and more footages every second. But such continuous recording of video doesn't benefit the users unless the video is ‘audited', according to Gautam Goradia, CEO and MD of India-based Hayagriva Software.
The company's product Com-sur allows users to review or audit surveillance video, make a backup of relevant footage and create standardized intelligent incident reports in PowePoint or PDF.
“Com-sur is more of a philosophy,” explained Goradia. “The philosophy is that you've got cameras, millions and millions of cameras across the world. That is not going to go down; cameras are only going to increase. But are crime rates going down as the camera numbers go up? That's not happening. So are we really achieving the outcomes of video surveillance?”
The company believes that cameras should be able to achieve three main functions – crime and loss prevention, improve business process and in case of crime, help solve it faster. In Goradia's opinion, most installations are not meeting these basic functions because the video captured is not utilized properly.
“We believe that this is because we are not making good use of the amount of data that the cameras are capturing,” Goradia continued. “There is so much information in video that is being wasted. And why is it wasted? Because the cameras are working 24/7/365, but we are not seeing what the cameras have seen. So nobody is auditing video.”
He further explained the applications of their product with some examples. If for instance, there is a bomb blast, the authorities will want to verify the nearby surveillance footage. Usually, no such incident will take place without the criminals first studying the area. They will do a recce to plan their attack at the location and this may be captured in the surveillance cameras. But only if you have an auditing system working with the camera can you easily spot these activities.
Com-sur also backs up video to a remote location or cloud, taking screenshots of the footage every one second. By doing this it strips the video of any unnecessary data and reduces the file size.
But perhaps its most significant use would be providing an incident report once an untoward incident happens.
“Suppose there is an incident, and it's all covered by video,” Goradia continued. “When an investigating officer comes in, what are the questions that he will ask? Essentially the 5Ws and one H (What, When Where, Why, Who and How). [With Com-sur] you are able to give the investigating officer an entire story with relevant screenshots, embedded in a PowerPoint document, which means it is a written incident report, has got all the video data in it, has got the entire story. This helps to solve the crime faster.”
The company sees opportunities for its product in the global market. Despite being an Indian company, the concerns of security market are the similar everywhere, according to Goradia. He added that the company aims to be the one common platform for any video feed across the world, regardless of the camera manufacturer and the video management system.