Live-streaming body-worn cameras: delivering safety and reassurance in the moment
Group Chairman & Chief Executive, David Savage of Excelerate Technology examines the key benefits of live-streaming body-worn cameras for emergency operations.
Ensuring the protection and safety of key workers has come to the fore this year. With a rise in the number of attacks on police, firefighters and paramedics, organisations must adopt new initiatives to safeguard their workers.
Body-worn cameras have been utilised by police, fire and ambulance workers across a vast range of applications for several years. Many of the traditional devices in current use are record-only and serve well in discouraging abusive behaviour, but they do not enable an organisation to quickly react to an escalating situation and aren’t always enough.
Fortunately, there is a better option. Our body-worn cameras with live-streaming capability deliver an objective view of an event as it unfolds and provides the wearer with safety and reassurance in the moment. If the wearer is at an incident, they can opt to continuously live-stream or they can trigger live video to be streamed to a central control room allowing more eyes on the situation, alerting other officers to take action if needed. The control room supervisor can also initiate the streaming remotely. This is incredibly valuable to lone workers who do not have access to instant support.
Mobile connectivity
Live-streaming body-worn cameras rely on uninterrupted connectivity. Devices like our Exstream body-worn camera are dual SIM for added reliability. Should one network become congested or unavailable, the user has a backup to continue the live stream. Conversely one of the SIMs could be on Excelerate’s Private 4G Network which is often deployed in areas where there is no other terrestrial network coverage. To minimise the risk of buffering or freezing, the device will automatically adapt the resolution and frame rate of the stream, which is particularly useful if the wearer is in an area with poor network coverage and still needs to transmit real-time footage.
Our 4G Extra cellular service is also a popular choice with customers who operate body-worn cameras and other IoT devices across multiple locations. These smart unsteered roaming SIMs have no priority network and will seamlessly switch to the best available connection ensuring significantly increased coverage, performance and added resilience.
Making Live-streams secure and more accessible
Excelerate customers also benefit from our Exstream Video Management Service, a simple web application that allows any number of users with an internet connection and the right credentials to access live streams.
One of the great benefits of Exstream is that it can bring multiple feeds together. For example, if you have a team wearing body-worn cameras, you could view multiple feeds together in real-time.
Exstream is not limited to just body-worn camera feeds either. We can bring feeds from any type of camera including unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), rapid deploy cameras and vehicle CCTV and camera systems. Any footage captured can also be stored and accessed for future requirements.
Security is a critical aspect of any solution being deployed. Advanced encryption techniques and support for private networks are key to protecting sensitive data. Due to the mission-critical aspect of what we provide, cyber security has always been a vital element of what we do. Our streaming service is hosted via our data centres which are ISO 27001 and national critical infrastructure approved (UK only), meaning they are fully redundant and immune to internet outages.Any footage or information streamed through Exstream is fully encrypted to provide the highest level of protection for our customers.
Scalability
The speed in which technology evolves makes it all the more important to invest in scalable solutions that can expand with operational requirements. Our Exstream body-worn device is more than your ordinary standard body-worn camera. It has the option of built-in GPS for improved location tracking and monitoring and a ‘push to talk’ function (PTT) that allows the wearer to utilise the device as a radio. The wearer can also benefit from a man-down alert button so if they run into any trouble, they can simply push a button to alert other officers. The man down button also triggers live streaming as well as sending location via GPS.
What sets us apart
With almost 20-years of experience, we continue to deliver simple and intuitive solutions – by listening to the needs of customers without compromising on the quality or ease-of-use required to support their operational environment. The solutions we provide are inherently secure and are developed and supported by our in-house R&D and engineering teams. if solutions are not readily available, we will work with our customers and develop it ourselves for them.
Learn more about our body-worn camera
