CCTV Systems Do More Than Protect Against Shoplifters
When CCTV systems first came onto the market, the cameras were somewhat large, produced heat and had vidicon tubes that when trained on one subject for an extended period of time had the image of that area burned into the tube. Despite their drawbacks many businesses adopted CCTV cameras and their systems as a tool to combat shoplifting. CCTV cameras today are now smaller, produce little or no heat, have chips that gather images and don’t burn in instead of vidicon tubes. The small sizes and high quality images produced by today’s CCTV cameras make an attractive and affordable solution to property protection.
There are few people who do not know that most businesses have CCTV systems inside of the store, office, warehouse or factory. What many people do not know is that the CCTV systems have moved outdoors and can be found in most store parking lots, watching gas pumps or providing perimeter security at factories, warehouses or truck parking areas. These outdoor cameras protect against vandalism, theft or other means of trespass.
CCTV cameras that are outdoors can often be recognized. The housing that holds the camera may be the size of a loaf of bread. Alternatively the housing can be a dome that is smoked glass or glazed silver or gold. These dome housings hang like pendants from walls and light poles. The cameras that are in the domes are often mounted to pan/tilt heads and equipped with telephoto zoom lenses. These devices permit the camera to scan the entire area around the camera and are not fixed to a single location. Should trespass be viewed by the operator, the pan/tilt head can be stopped in the location of the trespass, the camera zoomed in to the trespasser and the movements of that person followed with the pan/tilt function controlled manually. This ability allows one camera to do the function of several cameras thus reducing the overall cost of the CCTV system while increasing its effectiveness.
Exterior CCTV cameras and their housings are often subject to vandalism. This vandalism may be teens attempting to destroy something “just for the fun of it” or an actual intruder attempting to deny security their identification. Manufacturers are well aware of this problem and for areas that are or may be subject to vandalism provide ballistic rated housings. These ballistic rated housings are strong enough to withstand a bullet shot at the camera housing. More expensive than standard housings, for many areas, ballistic rated housings provide a cost savings to the owners of the property.
The utilization of security cameras to secure physical property, warehouses, truck parking areas, plants and parking lots provides the owner of the property the assurance that the property is always being looked after. The property owner does not have to pay a security staff to patrol the premises. This reduction in staff will pay for itself in a short time thus increasing the profit margin of the company. Additional savings may arise from a lowered insurance rate due to the CCTV system that is in place.
In the past, CCTV systems needed a human operator on site to monitor the CCTV system. The availability of the Internet has changed that. Fixed cameras equipped with motion detection can transmit video signals to a remote central station through the Internet. This ability allows the operator at the central station to view the intruder and notify the local law enforcement authorities. CCTV systems still protect the store owner against shoplifting. The advent of small efficient cameras and the ability to transmit video to central stations permits the exterior of a facility protection without the cost of security staff. These attributes of a CCTV system provide an effective cost saving to the property owner.
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