The security monitoring industry has reached new heights over the past decade and half. An industry that once primarily consisted of traditional central stations that provided basic intrusion, fire, and medical alarm monitoring, as well as security operations centers (SOCs) that mainly monitored private facilities’ alarms, video, and access control systems through disparate native interfaces, has become a vastly different market that has seen new types of service providers enter and many of the former overlap. This expansion of service levels has evolved as the monitoring industry has undergone tremendous levels of growth – both in terms of the volume of customers seeking service, as well as the types of services providers are now able to offer.
The key component that is driving this growth is managed video services. Remote video monitoring is a service that has been offered to the market for more than two decades now; however, it is only in the past 10 years or so that it has become more widely accepted and really taken hold. Video monitoring automation software is the principal ingredient that has made this possible by allowing service providers to monitor multiple disparate systems in a single interface.
Now there are service providers that essentially adhere to the traditional central station model, albeit with a holistically video-centric approach; meaning that all alarms have some sort of video associated with them for verification purposes and to provide more efficient action patterns for response protocols. Likewise, SOCs no longer must run multiple interfaces to monitor alarms from intrusion, fire or access control systems and then find the right camera(s) from yet another system interface to associate with those events.
Video monitoring software automation has streamlined the ability to seamlessly monitor these siloed systems and events in a single pane of glass, creating ease of use for operators that allows them to respond to security threats with speed, expediency, and confidence; thus, resulting in better security outcomes.
This growth and success have not come solely at the hands of automation providers; rather, in many cases through partnerships between the automation and other hardware, software and cloud service providers. Technologies such as video analytics and artificial intelligence (AI) were instrumental in helping monitoring providers tackle some of the early challenges such as false and nuisance alarm reduction, creating greater operational and cost efficiencies, as well enabling them to offer more premium level services to clients.
While the monitoring industry still faces challenges from verticals such as DIY services and others, automation providers and their technology partners are not resting on their laurels. Far from it, in fact.
The question has now become, “What is the next frontier for the video monitoring and managed services industry?” Technology providers are now building solutions that can enhance service offerings past the point of receiving an alarm or notification of a security threat and following a set response protocol. How can the industry tackle that “last mile” of creating a more effective dispatch, increase the chance of garnering an apprehension and providing the data and reporting to ensure that is done properly?
Immix is the industry-leading provider of software automation for managed video services and, as such, is at the forefront of working with technology partners to provide solutions to this effect.
The first area Immix decided to address is that of enhancing dispatch capabilities to get better intelligence into the hands of responders to allow for more effective and safer responses. Immix’s partnership with Incident Co., a live incident reporting solution provider, is a perfect example.
The joint solution between Immix and Incident Co. allows central station or SOC operators using the Immix platform to select alarm clips that demonstrate suspicious activity for real-time sharing. Once an IncidentCODE is generated within Immix, an automated report is sent to a predetermined recipient list. This automation expedites the communication process as the operator does not have to verbalize the threat to the customer, which shortens calls and therefore minimizes the critical passage of time. Should the call then be escalated to the authorities, the operator can then share a temporary 6-digit IncidentCODE over the phone, giving the first responders valuable, actionable intelligence that creates a safer and more efficient response as well as a better security outcome.
In addition, the clarity of threat level granted by IncidentCODE decreases false alarm fines for the customer. This solution enables Immix users to dramatically improve operational efficiency and foster better relationships with their own customers and first responders.
Another example is the Immix partnership with RSPNDR, a company that connects monitoring stations to a fast-growing, on-demand network of licensed mobile guards who quickly respond to alarms based on proximity to the incident location. This joint solution allows Immix users to access RSPNDR’s one-click mobile guard response services feature in the latest versions of the Immix CS and GF software platforms, greatly enhancing security event management. The solution is an embedded, end-to-end solution that allows central station operators monitoring video security events in the Immix platform to automatically generate a mobile security response through RSPNDR at the click of a button if there is a warranted threat on site. Each type of security event can have a custom response procedure using Immix dispatch protocol through RSPNDR’s network of distributed mobile guard companies to secure the sites on demand and provide complete transparency and reporting.
In addition, the automated creation of reports and sharing of rich media and dispositions from both above solutions removes the labor of these tasks, freeing operators to focus on more pressing matters for the customer. This enhanced operational speed results in less loss and more apprehension. In short, real-time sharing of video, intelligence and reports creates clear communication for all stakeholders and dramatically streamlines the resolution of security events.
The second area of emphasis in this “beyond monitoring” concept is that of immediate incident investigation. What if, with a couple of mouse clicks, an operator can get a positive identification of a suspect on site or immediately post-event?
Enter Captis Intelligence, an Immix partner that unifies situational awareness, geographic crime intelligence, social media investigation, face-matching intelligence, solveacrime.com, and access to the largest criminal database in North America.
Captis Intelligence has built the first centralized, cloud-based subject intelligence system connected to the world’s largest private database of open-source criminal files provided by county, state, and federal agencies.
Immix has partnered with Captis to offer users exclusive access to enable Captis Intelligence as an extension on any Immix site and have immediate access to:
- Over 100 Million + public criminal records
- Highly accurate face-matching
- Immediate identification of suspects with a criminal record using nearly any surveillance camera
This solution can be used during an event whereby an operator observes suspicious activity, is then able to take and send a snapshot of a suspect to the Captis cloud database, which will scan the image and return potential matches within seconds.
The solution can also be used in post-event investigation as users can upload images from any site directly to Captis. Captis will run the image through their database and return the results in a report, again within seconds.
This is truly groundbreaking technology, never before available to the security monitoring industry, that is only scratching the surface of its potential.
Video monitoring automation providers like Immix and their technology partners remain committed to seeking solutions to profoundly affect the security monitoring industry in a very meaningful way. Through solutions such as those outlined here, service providers can now successfully address that next frontier for the industry that includes ‘last mile’ communication with responding law enforcement and enhanced, real-time investigation capabilities resulting in more and faster apprehensions. There has long been a demand for solutions like these within the video monitoring and managed services marketplace and now the efforts of a few have produced tangible results that should have a tremendously beneficial impact in the future, both near and far.