Big Brother Business Is Always Watching You

In this posting,  Abigail Wang discusses how video surveillance is being used for more than just security.

Whether you like it or not, there are cameras everywhere that are watching you. In retail stores, on the streets, in the office, it doesn't seem like you can escape them. What do businesses do with all this footage, and what future plans are in store for video surveillance? Video security company Eagle Eye Networks released a recent report that details some of the key trends happening in business use of surveillance systems.

Customers' Best Interests in Mind?The survey included feedback from 500 Information Technology, Video Surveillance professionals and managers over the span of a year. One of the questions participants were asked was what their businesses' plans were for their next system upgrade. Sixty-eight percent plan to have their system usage include business operations and not simply for protection purposes only.
If video surveillance isn't being used primarily for protection, then what is it being used for? Over fifty percent of the respondents claimed that their businesses aimed to improve sales or customer support, and 44 percent wanted to focus on improving general employee productivity. Other important uses included analyzing customer behavior and reducing risk of injury.
Possible Cyberattacks on the Horizon

Approximately 65 percent of the companies in the survey claimed they want to implement some sort of cloud video recording, and 75 percent of the professionals acknowledged the advantages cloud-managed video surveillance systems have. Among their perks, these systems allow for flexible storage capacity, easier access to video content, and easier multi-site integration and upgrades.

For every positive, however, there is a negative. Nearly 80 percent of the respondents saw problems that could arise in cloud-managed video surveillance. The top concern was security; in fact almost 70 percent of the IT professionals surveyed believed that video surveillance systems are vulnerable to cyberattacks. Other concerns were high bandwidth usage, issues of reliability, and the possibly difficult transition to cloud-based systems.

Only Time Will TellCurrent video surveillance systems aren't exactly the best. Participants complained of poor image quality, multi-site issues with browser or camera incompatibility, and system unreliability.
Video surveillance systems, both cloud and on-premise recording, are certainly here to stay no matter what you think of them. Time will tell whether companies will be able to meet their needs with cloud-based surveillance.

Read more at PC Magazine.