A Cowboy Boot Full of New Technology Spotlighted at ASIS Exhibits

Security Magazine’s Blog continues on its keyboard tour. Check out these stops.

ENERGY STAR qualified, biodegradable supply cores and recyclable packaging make the new Datacard® SD260 card printer the industry's first desktop printer with environmentally focused features, according to Datacard Group, the world leader in secure ID and card personalization systems.

The SD260 printer's ENERGY STAR qualification makes it the first of its kind, according to the maker. The SD260 printer earned its ENERGY STAR qualification by requiring less energy than its predecessors and saving users money from reduced energy costs.

Key environmental features include: Bio-Tec Environmental EcoPure® chemical additive biodegradable supply cores that gradually break down in landfills, recyclable packaging to reduce waste and a soft-touch power-down button allowing users to increase energy efficiency. The SD260 printer helps support and sustain the environmental initiatives of Datacard printer users.

The SD260 printer also complies with Reduction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) and Waste Electrical Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive requirements. RoHS compliance indicates that the SD260 printer upholds international regulations defined by the European Union, including manufacturing restrictions on hazardous chemicals and proper methods of recovery, treatment and recycling. The WEEE directive ensures responsible measures in setting collection, recycling and recovery methods.

Call it Axis' Corridor Format from Axis Communications. Adapted to address a critical need across a variety of industries from retail to enterprise security, Axis' Corridor Format is the first to allow a vertical field of view for improved surveillance in narrow areas of interest, like staircases, hallways, aisles, roads, runways and tunnels. Those attending ASIS International are seeing a demonstration of the product. Businesses are finding that the traditional landscape format is not the most appropriate solution for monitoring corridors, hallways and other narrow areas because it creates a video stream whereby a large part of the field of view - specifically the sides of the image - is unneeded. As a result, the image quality is not maximized, and the full area and resolution of the camera's image sensor is underutilized. Aside from providing the end-user with surplus images from areas that do not require monitoring, this also results in wasted bandwidth and storage.

Now, organizations can use Axis' Corridor Format to achieve a vertically-oriented video stream from the camera, perfectly adapted to a narrow monitored area, which maximizes image quality while eliminating typical bandwidth and storage waste of landscape formats. The Corridor Format is useful with modern HDTV network cameras that deliver a 16:9 aspect ratio since the resulting image will have a 9:16 aspect ratio and include all the other benefits of the HDTV standard: full frame rate and guaranteed resolution and fidelity.

"This new 9:16 view of the Axis Corridor Format will allow for a high-quality video image of a complete aisle using just a single network camera, even in high racking environments," said Claude Verville, Vice President, Loss Prevention, Safety & Hazmat, Lowe's Companies, Inc.

Axis' Corridor Format is made possible through a combination of two innovative features. First, either the entire Axis camera is installed sideways or the unique 3-axis lens found inside an Axis fixed dome camera is rotated 90 degrees during mounting. Second, the video image is rotated back 90 degrees using the camera's configuration interface - a feature that requires superior processing power and is unique to Axis' network cameras - so that the operator can view the image as it was meant to be seen.

What is Spectral Pattern Matching Technology? TransTech will tell you. Visualant, in authentication systems technology, unveiled  its Spectral Pattern Matching (SPM) technology at the ASIS booth of the Visualant subsidiary TransTech Systems.

The demonstration unit was built by the RatLab LLC technology team under contract from Visualant. This demo unit marks the end of a three-year development program. The SPM technology is based on low-cost, high-speed, light-based security and quality control solutions for use in homeland security, anti-counterfeiting, forgery/fraud prevention, brand protection and process control applications. The patent-pending technology uses controlled illumination with specific bands of light, to establish a unique spectral signature for both individual and classes of items. When matched against existing databases, these spectral signatures allow precise identification and authentication of any item or substance.

The size of a smart phone, the demonstration unit not only showcases the authentication and diagnostic capabilities of the SPM technology, it also illustrates one form the technology can take as Visualant begins to move its transformative technology into the marketplace.

Also at ASIS, BRS Labs talks about the inclusion of AISight into the integrated Boeing VSOC Virtual Shield suite of products. Virtual Shield is a part of the VSOC Sentinel Family of Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) solutions. AISight will provide behavioral analysis amidst the Virtual Shield suite of sensors including unattended ground sensors, FLIR EO/IR cameras, ground radars, sniper shot detectors, radar and UAV platforms. The sensors are joined together by the VSOC Sentinel core command and control situational awareness software platform. There will be a demonstration on the integrated solution during the upcoming ASIS International Conference in Dallas.

"Boeing selected BRS Labs' AISight after successfully testing the software for several months in our video surveillance lab," says John "JT" Thompson, VSOC Virtual Shield sales manager. "We evaluated several video analytic products and AISight performed exceptionally well in field testing. The autonomous learning, ease of installation and integration into VSOC Sentinel made it a solid fit for our Virtual Shield platform. Our customers have been demanding an intelligent video surveillance capability and we believe BRS Labs has developed the technology to fill this demand." BRS LABS has developed the world's first video surveillance behavioral analytics platform, known as AISight, designed to autonomously serve as the eyes and brain for critical security environments, watching and identifying suspicious behavior 24/7. The artificial neural network within AISight, able to track and identify hundreds of individual moving objects simultaneously, learns to differentiate between normal behavioral patterns and abnormal activity, alerting on suspicious actions as they unfold. AISight is deployed globally across critical infrastructure facilities, intelligence agency applications, and urban areas.

"Our integration into the Boeing VSOC platform provides a much-needed force multiplier for the modern warfighter," says John Frazzini, president of BRS Labs. "The Boeing VSOC platform is a field tested and proven performer, fusing a wide array of sensors to provide critical situational data both in-theater and domestically." Frazzini continues, "AISight provides Boeing's ISR solution with advanced situational learning and autonomous analysis of video surveillance data captured from thousands of cameras. Today's threats are multi-layered and require the sophisticated use of advanced technology. Video intelligence systems and today's integrated ISR solutions are significantly limited without real time automated learning based analysis." Behavioral Analytics(TM) technology platform, the backbone of the AISight system, combines computer vision with machine learning technology to provide actionable intelligence through real-time anomalous behavioral patterns. This field-tested, proven product takes visual input from a live camera or recorded video, autonomously learns what activities and behaviors normally occur within each unique camera's environment, and notifies security personnel of anomalous behaviors with real-time alerts. AISight's easy installation and setup require no coding of rules or trip lines and no designation or masking of any areas within the camera's field of view. AISight can effectively and efficiently enhance the security industry's efforts to watch the tens of millions of video cameras used globally - providing faster identification of evolving threats and better protection of critical assets. AISight is currently successfully deployed in applications across the globe that typically confound traditional video detection systems including seaports, airports, transportation, law enforcement, public facilities, and other complex environments involving large-scale and diverse distribution of surveillance cameras.