Reading this story about the girl apparently abducted from a Target parking lot (they believe they have found her body in Missouri at a lake), one of the things I've seen was the parking lot video surveillance footage, which was apparently rather poor (seems to be out of focus) and is now off at a crime lab with hopes they might be able to improve it some. It got me thinking about how often security end users check to see if the cameras are working properly and focused. I am similarly reminded by the story of a recent armed robbery/murder where a store's CCTV system was entirely down -- no footage obtained at all in that incident.
So, do you have a protocol/policy for how often you do regular maintenance checks on the video surveillance system? Everyone please answer this question, security directors, security officers, LP, installers, integrators, service techs, anyone working with/around CCTV...I would love to know whether this is an issue we need to raise in our industry.
(I suspect the answer is not as good as we'd like it be - I know a retailer in Atlanta who has all of their fixed parking lot security cameras out of focus, where you probably couldn't even identify what type of car is in the parking space closest to the store. Fortunately, their indoor cameras are quite sharp, but it is as if they only have the parking lot cameras for "show".)
So, do you have a protocol/policy for how often you do regular maintenance checks on the video surveillance system? Everyone please answer this question, security directors, security officers, LP, installers, integrators, service techs, anyone working with/around CCTV...I would love to know whether this is an issue we need to raise in our industry.
(I suspect the answer is not as good as we'd like it be - I know a retailer in Atlanta who has all of their fixed parking lot security cameras out of focus, where you probably couldn't even identify what type of car is in the parking space closest to the store. Fortunately, their indoor cameras are quite sharp, but it is as if they only have the parking lot cameras for "show".)
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