Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/31791
14 NEWS www.securitysystemsnews.com JUNE 2011 SECURITY SYSTEMS NEWS WIRELESS TRIALS BECOME PERMANENT FOR SEATTLE PD By Leischen Stelter SEATTLE—Adopting wireless mesh technology has involved a series of trial deployments in different parts of the city by the Seattle Police Department, but will soon turn into a more permanent surveillance solution. Its first trial began in February 2009 as a one-month deployment of nine cameras using equipment from Azalea Networks, which included 11 access points in Pioneer Square. The network quickly turned into a one-year deployment, said Monty Moss, a detective with the SPD, who has been in charge of deploying a surveillance solution for the agency. For that deployment, the agency used a fiber connection to bring the video back to the command post to be shared, he said. Then, in July 2009, the agency deployed a temporary surveillance network to monitor the 50,000 peo- ple who attended the city’s annual Fourth of July fireworks event in the city’s Gas Works Park. “It was a cozy fit and we were nervous there were going to be too many people,” said Moss. “We put four access points up within the park in the area looking at the entrances of the park and then put access points on the police patrol boats.” Despite small interferences from the fireworks display, Moss said the temporary solution added significant situational awareness for law enforcement. Then, during New Year’s Eve COPS has the most advanced “4G” wholesale monitoring network! 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Monitoring America from New Jersey, Florida, Arizona, and now Tennessee celebrations in 2010, the agency put up portable cameras to a single access point, which fed wirelessly to a mobile command post. During that deployment the agency ran into geographic challenges because sig- nals couldn’t be transmitted through buildings, so additional wireless access points had to be added to the city’s iconic Space Needle, said Moss. Moss said the reason this solution worked so well was because of the open-standard platform. “We don’t have to have an Acme logo camera talking to an Acme router,” he said. “We can use off-the-shelf technol- ogy to make it work.” Moss said the agency is using WPA2/AES data encryption on all devices to ensure the network is secure. “It’s a lot less expensive to deploy this and not have to dig trenches.” —Monty Moss, Seattle PD Then, in May 2010, Azalea Networks was acquired by Aruba Networks. Using Aruba’s wireless mesh technology, Moss said the agency will continue to expand its network. The mesh network solu- tion made a lot of financial sense, he said. “For us this is a common sense approach and it’s a lot less expensive to deploy this and not have to dig trenches and it’s much more cost effective to do it wirelessly and it gives us more flexibility,” he said. The agency recently won a grant to add an access point network around Columbia Center, which is the tallest building in the Pacific Northwest, to surveil and protect that tower. With this project, Moss said he hopes to involve other build- ing owners to share the network and work together to enhance security in the area. Scan code to visit Entrust your alarm monitoring to the proven reliability of COPS! our website YOUR FOUNDATION FOR GROWTH: Yesterday. Today. Tomorrow. New Jersey | Florida | Arizona | Tennessee Toll Free: 800.367.2677 | Fax: 856.629.4043 | sales@copsmonitoring.com | www.copsmonitoring.com CA: ACO6132 ▫ DE: 05-85 ▫ FL: EF20000481 ▫ IL: 127-001299 ▫ MD: 107-840 ▫ TN: 00000632 ▫ TX Burg: B11561, TX Fire ▫ ACR-2215 ▫ VA: 11-1941 The agency has also been awarded a grant from FEMA to enhance its port security. The grant will allow the city to add 180 access points in the city of Seattle as well as access points along the waterfront, making it a “true mesh network that will allow public responders to look at cameras,” he said. “This will give us the ability to have patrol cars, and fire departments log into the network.” This enhanced network will also incorporate other devices including CBRN (chemical, bio- logical, radiological, and nuclear) sensors or other types of IP devices to be transmitted via this network. This system may also include public WiFi access. For such deployments, the next issue for the city is to ensure it has enough capacity to backhaul all this traffic, said Frederick Harris, senior manager of product marketing for Aruba Networks. The multifarious SEATTLE see page 15