Like other large seaports, Canada’s Halifax Port Authority has to juggle competing priorities to protect itself against possible terrorist attacks. Its biggest challenge is monitoring the nearly 14 million metric tons of cargo that pass through the facility each year. Security officials must also protect commercial and private boats and numerous container and fuel terminals on the 241 acres of port authority land that surround the water.
It’s financially impossible to hire enough security employees to patrol the entire deepwater port, but managers say they have an effective alternative. They plan to install a sprawling electronic early-warning system that will use video cameras, radar, motion sensors and shipboard Automatic Identification System transponders to monitor the area.
To ease the burden of analyzing all the data those sensors will generate, the system will use video-analysis software that can alert guards if unidentified ships or individuals enter the area.
“The software significantly enhances our ability to detect and therefore deter someone from attempting some form of a nefarious incident,” said Gord Helm, manager of port security and marine operations at the port authority.
The port authority is completing the first phase of a $20 million electronic-surveillance project, which includes a $10 million command-and-control center with a wall-sized screen to display images enhanced by identification and monitoring software from PureTech Systems.
“The software is important for us because we can drill down into the video picture in the event of an alarm and then be able to initiate a response that is appropriate [for] what we are looking at,” Helm said.
Ongoing challenges Such complex video surveillance installations are spurring the growth of a worldwide video-analysis market. Topping $60 million in 2005, the sector could reach $400 million by 2012, said Dilip Sarangan, a research analyst at Frost and Sullivan who specializes in security issues.
However, the market faces challenges in reaching that size. For one thing, the accuracy of analytical algorithms must improve. “This is still very, very much an emerging technology,” Sarangan said. “Only in the last year or two have we started to see companies actually implementing these solutions so they could be used as a complete security solution.”
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