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Watch Out: No One Saw?

“Look behind you! Behind you!”

If you have ever seen a horror movie you’re likely familiar with the classic, adrenalized moment where the unwitting star is oblivious to the monster lurking behind her. The tension provoking the movie audience to think, if not audibly urge the screen star to look behind her to avoid attack. 

Cut to the U.S. Capitol Police command center the night of October 28, 2022. There, on a small screen, buried within data from nearly 2,000 video surveillance cameras, was a human monster. In one preplanned slash, he brought the head of a steel hammer down on a sliding glass door, shattering an opening wide enough to step through. Hammer in hand he entered the home of Paul and Nancy Pelosi, while 82 year old Paul lay sleeping. This reads like a scene in a horror movie. But we all know by now, it is not. This really happened. And unlike in the movies no one was there to yell, think or advise Paul to “look behind him”, because no one was watching it unfold, ahead of, or in real time. At the time of this post Mr. Pelosi remains in the ICU pending recovery from this attack. We wish him well. (Updated: Thankful Mr. Pelosi is back home and on the road to recovery.)

And yes, the Pelosi’s had security cameras. Which means very little because security cameras do not keep us safe. The average video security camera captures over 11,000 alerts on a daily basis. In order to detect malicious intent, an actual human eye would have to watch, assess, process and filter every single one of those alerts. Exhausting. And worse, fallible. Not because humans are flawed, but because the system is. Since 1949 when video surveillance first allowed remote visibility to sites such as banks and the 1951 introduction of the video tape recorder, not much has changed. Camera pixelation quality and range has improved, playback has gotten more sophisticated but the success of the system in detecting crime has been incumbent upon human intelligence and stamina. Which isn’t realistic. The average person can maintain focus on a monitor for roughly twenty minutes before losing their ability to discern critical event content. Without a screening device to ignore useless content, at the volume of alerts generated per camera, the successful management of alerts is without question unmanageable today by humans. 

So, is artificial intelligence the savior? Could a device capable of identifying and filtering information to distill it down to a manageable amount the be-all and end-all answer? The answer is no, times two. Because one, artificial intelligence is only as good as it is smart. Not all AI is created equal. Thresholds of sensitivity will impact detection volume. Shadows, low lighting, and bad weather will impact detection. What about the application of true intelligence? The camera identifies a “cow” but does the camera know if it is a real cow or merely a person dressed in a cow costume? And secondly, what good is an alert if no one sees it? All AI can do is detect. But if there is not a system in place to accurately and immediately issue an effective response the hammer will still come down. The monster will still come inside. 

I am going to stop here and get personal for a moment. My name is Rachel Swardson and I am the director of marketing at Camect. My background is in journalism with a minor in theology. I have always been fascinated by why good people do bad things, because I do believe people are fundamentally good. I put myself through college working as a bartender and as a private investigator. With a degree in journalism and four years of experience in the private investigation field I ended up working in Washington D.C. on the cop show America’s Most Wanted. At that time, many years ago, I believed that justice was achieved by catching the bad guy. Decades later, as mother, daughter of aging parents and home owner I now believe justice comes from preventing the crime in the first place. We live in a world where crime prevention is now possible because of artificial intelligence and our knowledge of predictive behavior. It is now incumbent upon us to prevent crimes from happening because we can. Really good, truly smart artificial intelligence detection software makes it possible, and affordable.

The attack on the Pelosi family could have been prevented if the command center had layered in the superior artificial intelligence of Camect. With the Camect Smart Camera Hub connected to their network, the moment a person stepped on their property, breaking the defined perimeter, an unmissable alert would have appeared on the small screen. It would have been unmissable because it would not have competed with useless alerts from common triggers such as squirrels, raccoons, leafs or a bug crawling on the camera lens. Camect filters out useless information and doesn’t send those alerts. Not only would the Pelosis’ property be more secure because critical alerts would not be missed, but their data would be too. Camect is edge based, not hosted in the cloud where it could be hacked. No need to rip out and replace cameras either. Camect is compatible with almost every single camera in the market today. AI is the next evolution of security for security cameras that have the potential to make our security more secure. 

Together we can’t stop the monsters from lurking but with Camect and a video security camera we can keep them getting in and getting away. Watch Out for each other and our next issue. Please let us know your comments or questions. If there are any topics you would like covered, or want your story featured on our page please send me a DM to set up an interview.

 

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Our Customers Have Saved Millions of Dollars

Camect keeps our communities safer by preventing crime.
We do this by adding intelligence to your existing security camera. Without Camect, a regular security camera is nothing but empty, electronic eyes with a memory. It can't tell the difference between a plant and a person. The camera simply detects motion, records it, then sends a clip. This clip must be reviewed by real human eyes to assess if it is a real threat, or well, just nothing. Fortunately it is usually nothing, but unfortunately that "nothing" costs time, attention and in some cases, sleep.

The founders of Camect created a better way to look only at something specific.
With a proactive approach to detection our intelligent software can detect, with over 99.5% accuracy, over 30 unique objects. Only the images you deem threatening, or interesting, are instantly transmitted. You will see the action in real time and can use an audio talk down, or siren to deter criminals. And yes, you got it! That means you are never bothered by things like bees buzzing or plants blowing in the wind. Your video is also stored on premises, not in a cloud. This offers you more security by reducing the risk of a privacy breach.

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