April 25, 2006

Little Brother

From the Village Voice:

A nice piece on the role of cameras in the hands of everyone. While we often worry about the big brother issues related to surveillance, this article discusses problems related to the "little brother". An example is the Holla Beck web site that fights street harassment by showing pictures of the catcallers. Another example is the woman in South Korea that was photographed because she did not clean up after her dog on the subway. That photo resulted in her public humiliation and the title "Dog Poop Girl". The article provides good background on this issue and has extended quotes from experts, such as Marc Rotenberg and Daniel Solove.

Posted by rshah at 08:32 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 24, 2006

InfrAegis

From a press release:

InfrAegis Inc. (Ia) is releasing a new product. iaMedium is a national security and public safety communication system with the ability to detect a variety of hazardous threats, deploy prescripted countermeasures, and provide a first responder communications system to ensure reliable broadcasting in the event of a catastrophic terrorist attack or natural disaster.

iaMedium incorporates four of IA's detection systems:
(1) Nuclear/Radioactive Isotope Detection System--statistically eliminates the possibility of false positive alarms;
(2) Computer-Aided Trace Detection System--determines whether weapons of mass destruction, explosives, firearms, opiates, vehicle-smuggled humans, or other contraband materials are present;
(3) Incident Video Synchronization System (IVSS)--records multiple streams of digital video in both day and night formats, positively identifying a detected vehicle, cargo container, or person via remote monitoring; and
(4) Global Operations Monitoring and Analysis Center (GOMAC)--monitors, records, analyzes, alerts, and enacts automatic preapproved electronic countermeasures when a threat is detected.

Administracion Portuaria Integral (API) (Integral Port Administration in English), in an effort to make the Port of Manzanillo one of the safest ports in Mexico, worked with InfrAegis to install the Vehicle/Pedestrian/Rail Detection System, (which incorporates Ia's Nuclear/Radioactive Isotope Detection System and GOMAC). This system has been operating in Mexico's Port of Manzanillo without interruption since November 2005. The system, detects radioactive and nuclear material entering or exiting the Port without disrupting port operations or workflow.

Posted by rshah at 09:43 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Glitch hits O'Hare Cameras

From the Sun-Times:

Apparently the outdated cameras at O'Hare are having problems. The OEMC said that a corrupted data file affected the 1,000 camera network at O'Hare. This corrupted data file affected the "automatic trigger" function for door alarms that automatically sends video of the breach to the dispatcher. Now operators have to manually dial up the video. According to Velasquez of the OEMC, the software is fixed. But the Sun-Times reports that other employees state the camera system is still malfunctioning in many ways. The article states:

"There's a serious, airport-wide problem with the cameras," said a source familiar with the problem. "The cameras are going up and down. They're in service. They're out of service. They're working. They're not working. They come and go. They don't have a picture on the monitor. They don't see anything." For at least a week, dispatchers had no video on their consoles, according to an employee who works at the O'Hare Operations Center. Even after the temporary fix, the system is not working properly, the employee said. "If we got an alarm, we used to be able to choose that camera and look. You can't do that right now. They hot-wired it. Whatever [video] pops up, pops up. We have to send security for every single thing," the employee said.

Part of the problem is that the cameras were installed in 1991 and are now outdated. Velasquez said that the camera system would be upgraded to the new Operation Virtual Shield platform.

The article also notes that the construction of a new runway removed part of a $18 million electronic fence. Originally, the fence had its own sensors that would trigger if anyone tried to climb over the fence. But with part of the fence removed, these sensors are disabled.

Posted by rshah at 09:37 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 23, 2006

Testing Facial Recognition in Japan

From The Japan Times Online:

A column in the Japan Times notes that there will be testing of facial recognition software at the Kasumigaseki Station in Tokyo. An interesting twist is that they will close down part of the station, so that the public won't be photographed. Here is a snip:

For an hour or two each day over the course of two to three weeks, one of the station's ticket gates will be closed to the general public. A newly-developed biometric camera, capable not only of photographing faces, but of analyzing facial data and in essence converting each person's face into a unique bar code, will be at work, snapping shots of participants in the experiment as they pass back and forth through the gate. Its point is to assess how well the camera works.

Posted by rshah at 08:27 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

NY Times Mischaracterizes Smart Cameras

From The New York Times:
A short article on the efficacy of surveillance cameras with a bit on smart cameras. First, it notes the debate over the efficacy of cameras. This is constant trope in stories with surveillance cameras with one side pointing to statistics in their city (such as Chicago) versus the studies in the UK that show cameras were generally not very effective. The end of the article is rather dismissive of smart camera technology:

Chicago is beginning a trial project using software that will sift through thousands of hours of video, trying to recognize unusual behavior, like leaving behind a suitcase. Such software is largely unproven, noted Elaine Newton, a fellow at the Stanford Law School Center for Internet and Society. "These things are going to have error rates," she said. Face recognition and other biometric applications are particularly difficult, and often the results depend on the quality of the image or the lighting. "Typically surveillance cameras are pretty low quality," she said. And they are often exposed to heat, which degrades image quality even more. As a result, Ms. Newton said, "real-time analysis of lots of cameras isn't something that's going to be invested in."

I don't with agree Elaine Newton as she is quoted in this article. First, Newton has done some work on smart camera topics with a paper on preserving privacy by de-identifying face images for the IEEE. However, she is totally wrong that real-time analysis is not going to be invested in. There are a whole slew of vendors selling these technologies, such as Vistascape, as well as government procurement policies that are seeking these technologies (Secure Border Initiative).

While there are significant problems with some smart camera technologies, such as facial recognition, there are other smart camera technologies that already are useful. If if real-time analysis is not yet useful, why wouldn't there be investment in the technology? Maybe I am too close to the issue, but I see enormous promise by adding "smarts" to the processing of camera footage.

I don't want to be too hard on Newton, because I am sure her words are somewhat twisted. Maybe she is saying that we won't add real time analysis to existing old analog cameras that don't have the resolution for facial recognition or analyzing crowd behavior. Nevertheless, this article doesn't accurately reflect what is happening with smart camera technology.

Posted by rshah at 08:21 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 18, 2006

Smart Traffic Signals in Chicago

From the Chicago Tribune:
A very nice article on how Chicago is trying to deal with traffic congestion. For background on this topic, see these two posts from last year, 1 & 2.
It mentions a number of different strategies they are using. They include:

1. Installing bus-priority signal systems on CTA buses. Examples of these systems are MIRT, 3M Opticom, and Tomar Strobecom. This technology has resulted in improvements of running times from 17% to 20%, as well as ridership, according to Michael Bolton of the CTA.

2. Changeable message boards to prompt motorists to take alternative routes

3. Synchronizing traffic lights to reduce travel times

• There are 400 intersections and 60 more planned in 2006 are interconnected and synchronized
• 2000 traffic intersections synchronized out of 2800
• Interconnection allows for cameras and other technologies to monitor and modify traffic flow. This can result in a 15% improvement in travel times.
• The holy grail is "being able to adjust traffic signals in response to situations, rather than changing signal timings only at predetermined hours each day, will improve traffic flow around accidents, crime scenes and special events."

4. They realize that sometime smart traffic technology doesn't work:

In 2001, Chicago tested self-setting traffic signals at about a dozen River North intersections. The signals were designed to gauge congestion and automatically adjust based on the traffic flow. But the experiment was stopped after several months because the system could not process the high volume of traffic data quickly enough to relay instructions back to the traffic lights in a timely manner, Montazery said. "The concept is very promising, but there are still technology issues to be resolved," he said.

Posted by rshah at 09:41 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack