Archiving Security

Archiving Security

When moving to a new headquarters four times larger, the School of Information and Communication of the University of the Republic of Uruguay in Montevideo needed to implement a video surveillance system that provides high quality, reliability and accessibility

The University wanted to implement a robust VMS with good video storage capacity that included alarms and notifications for motion detection or perimeter crossings in order to control potential external and, most importantly, internal theft. It was essential to integrate the system into an existing network infrastructure to meet the established budget that did not include new coaxial cable installations.

The Existing Infrastructure

The school and security integrator decided on Milestone Systems XProtect Professional VMS software plus cameras from Digital Watchdog DWC-PB2M4TIR and Vivotek IP9181-H.

School security staff wanted a versatile and easy to install in a virtual computerized system. It does not require dedicated equipment (standard IT hardware works fine) and the interfaces and access levels allow the user to easily implement an optimal monitoring center. The alarm panel provides quick identification of events and sends night-time alerts via SMS to the mobile number designated for each shift.

The administration of the system is simple and it comes with XProtect Smart Client, a display interface that works in desktops or Milestone Mobile that manages video from smartphones and tablets. Milestone allows the integration of cameras from a very wide range of manufacturers and offers a complete metric analysis.

Early in 2017, the School of Information and Communication (FIC) was inaugurated at the University of the Republic of Uruguay (Udelar). The university’s website announced that the new headquarters aimed to strengthen the core mission of the school created in 2013. It regained a large space that went unused for decades and part of the senior living facility, Asáma Dámaso Antonio. It is a structure of 8,500 square meters and four floors that house nearly 4,000 students, 200 teachers and 80 administrative and logistics staff on a daily basis.

Inside the Building

In addition to classrooms and administrative offices, there is a large and modern library, audio and video recording rooms and an advanced television studio. With the presence of such modern technological investments in the property, the concern about theft and damage increased, due to the high traffic of faculty, students and visitors that could access the control and monitoring of the equipment and devices.

“The new headquarters greatly increased the vulnerability points for security,” said Yonathan Benelli, IT manager at Udelar. “Without a system like the one now implemented, it would be unfeasible to maintain an acceptable level of security.”

Benelli adds that despite the need for a professional video surveillance system for the educational institution, “It was unthinkable to carry out a CCTV installation with coaxial cabling due to its high cost. Therefore, the installation of the Milestone IP video management system within the existing IT network infrastructure versus performing a coaxial interconnection resulted in a very significant cost reduction.”

The savings were not only in technology acquisition, but also in hardware and human resources.

“We estimate that without this system, we would have needed at least four added employees dedicated to surveillance. Also, we took advantage of existing hardware to implement virtualization,” Benelli said.

A Custom-made Solution

Foxsys, the company managing the technology integration for this project, proposed the implementation of Milestone’s XProtect Professional solution. It is an open interface application designed for IP video management software with easy, intuitive and powerful functions.

The Smart Client interface has advanced search tools that combine with an easy-tonavigate video timeline, allowing users to quickly and accurately examine events. It also offers sophisticated export options, including the Storyboard feature, which helps consolidate relevant video evidence to gain a complete view of incidents.

“The software was selected because of the systems notifications which were important in this application,” said Juan Martín González, commercial director of the integrating firm.

He said the solution was complemented by two virtual machines that operate on an HP server and are managed by the software Promox, which proved highly reliable. Digital Watchdog cameras were used.

“In particular, the DW cameras allowed us to have a 180-degree panorama of some specific areas and other cameras were extremely useful because Milestone recognizes the algorithms of crossing a perimeter line that run in the camera,” Gonzalez said. “From there, we fed the alarm panel, thus reducing the need for central processing. For the communication, a data network was implemented on Cat 6 UTP and HPE POE 1920 switches. In terms of storage, we used the NAS QNAP brand with eight bays of 4TB each, implementing a raid 5 for more protection and writing speed. We were surprised how well Milestone worked on a Proxmox virtual machine.”

Countless Advantages and High Satisfaction

For the administration of the system in general, twelve people were trained over two days. “Everyone quickly understood XProtect Smart Client despite having little previous experience—some had worked with a rudimentary analog solution before. The system operators were very satisfied with the interface and its excellent performance in terms of quality and frames per second,” González said.

For the institution, the advantages of this implementation are numerous. Benelli indicated that the virtualization implementation allows them to immediately have a copy of the server data at the moment a network failure should occur, minimizing the loss of security video and avoiding hours or days waiting for the replacement of hardware or software.

The benefits, as Benelli points out, are countless and include: the capacity to manage multiple cameras simultaneously; comprehensive remote monitoring; end-user event search functionality; more advanced recording and navigation settings; easier role definition and permissions management of user accessibility.

“The implementation was a success in every sense, not only from the point of view of the service provided by the system,” Benelli said “But also by the guidance, suggestions and labor that the company provided beyond the installation and configuration, in which all the required and additional goals were met.”

This article originally appeared in the March 2018 issue of Security Today.

Featured

  • Security Today Announces The Govies Government Security Award Winners for 2025

    Security Today is pleased to announce the 2025 winners in The Govies Government Security Awards. The awards honor outstanding government security products in a variety of categories. Read Now

  • Survey: 60 Percent of Organizations Using AI in IT Infrastructure

    Netwrix, a cybersecurity provider focused on data and identity threats, today announced the release of its annual global 2025 Cybersecurity Trends Report based on a global survey of 2,150 IT and security professionals from 121 countries. It reveals that 60% of organizations are already using artificial intelligence (AI) in their IT infrastructure and 30% are considering implementing AI. Read Now

  • New Research Reveals Global Video Surveillance Industry Perspectives on AI

    Axis Communications, the global industry leader in video surveillance, has released its latest research report, ‘The State of AI in Video Surveillance,’ which explores global industry perspectives on the use of AI in the security industry and beyond. The report reveals current attitudes on AI technologies thanks to in-depth interviews with AI experts from Axis’ global network and a comprehensive survey of more than 5,800 respondents, including distributors, channel partners, and end customers across 68 countries. The resulting insights cover AI integration and the opportunities and challenges that exist with regard to security, safety, business intelligence, and operational efficiency. Read Now

  • SIA Urges Tariff Relief for Security Industry Products

    Today, the Security Industry Association has sent a letter to U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer and U.S. Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick requesting relief from tariffs for security industry products and asking that the Trump administration formulate a process that allows companies to apply for product-specific exemptions. The security industry is an important segment of the U.S. economy, contributing over $430 billion in total economic impact and supporting over 2.1 million jobs. Read Now

  • Report Shows Cybercriminals Continue Pivot to Stealthier Tactics

    IBM recently released the 2025 X-Force Threat Intelligence Index highlighting that cybercriminals continued to pivot to stealthier tactics, with lower-profile credential theft spiking, while ransomware attacks on enterprises declined. IBM X-Force observed an 84% increase in emails delivering infostealers in 2024 compared to the prior year, a method threat actors relied heavily on to scale identity attacks. Read Now

New Products

  • Luma x20

    Luma x20

    Snap One has announced its popular Luma x20 family of surveillance products now offers even greater security and privacy for home and business owners across the globe by giving them full control over integrators’ system access to view live and recorded video. According to Snap One Product Manager Derek Webb, the new “customer handoff” feature provides enhanced user control after initial installation, allowing the owners to have total privacy while also making it easy to reinstate integrator access when maintenance or assistance is required. This new feature is now available to all Luma x20 users globally. “The Luma x20 family of surveillance solutions provides excellent image and audio capture, and with the new customer handoff feature, it now offers absolute privacy for camera feeds and recordings,” Webb said. “With notifications and integrator access controlled through the powerful OvrC remote system management platform, it’s easy for integrators to give their clients full control of their footage and then to get temporary access from the client for any troubleshooting needs.”

  • Automatic Systems V07

    Automatic Systems V07

    Automatic Systems, an industry-leading manufacturer of pedestrian and vehicle secure entrance control access systems, is pleased to announce the release of its groundbreaking V07 software. The V07 software update is designed specifically to address cybersecurity concerns and will ensure the integrity and confidentiality of Automatic Systems applications. With the new V07 software, updates will be delivered by means of an encrypted file.

  • QCS7230 System-on-Chip (SoC)

    QCS7230 System-on-Chip (SoC)

    The latest Qualcomm® Vision Intelligence Platform offers next-generation smart camera IoT solutions to improve safety and security across enterprises, cities and spaces. The Vision Intelligence Platform was expanded in March 2022 with the introduction of the QCS7230 System-on-Chip (SoC), which delivers superior artificial intelligence (AI) inferencing at the edge.