iwce 2010: wireless video surveillance 101

1

Wireless Infrastructure for Security & Surveillance

Ksenia Coffman, Firetide

IWCE 2010: Wireless Surveillance 101

March 9, 2010

Agenda

� Why wireless?

� Wireless options

� Considerations for wireless video systems

� Case studies

� Municipal public safety; Industrial operations;

2

� Municipal public safety; Industrial operations;

Transportation security

� Planning a successful wireless system

Why Wireless?

� Cost savings

� Deploy virtually anywhere

� Mobility and flexibility

3

� Mobility and flexibility

� Extend or back-up wired

infrastructure

Industrial TransportationPublic Safety

Who Needs Wireless Surveillance?

Education

4

Industrial TransportationPublic Safety

Government Utilities

Education

Telecom

Wireless Challenges

� Availability of channels & spectrum

� RF interference

� Dynamic RF & physical environment

5

� Dynamic RF & physical environment

� “Trust but verify” attitude required

Wireless Options

6

Wireless Frequency Bands

Licensed? Line of site Advantage Disadvantage

900 MHz Unlicensed Not required Improved street-level

penetration

Lower throughput

for video compared

to other bands

2.4 GHz Unlicensed Required Better penetration

compared to 5 GHz

Interference from

consumer devices

7

compared to 5 GHz consumer devices

4.9 GH Licensed Required Reserved for public

safety; less

interference

Requires frequency

coordination with

other agencies

5 GHz Unlicensed Required Better range and less

interference

compared to 2.4 GHz

Lower penetration

than 2.4 GHz

Point to Point

� Pros

8

� Dedicated connection

� Highest bandwidth for backhaul

� Cons

� Does not scale; no flexibility

� Single point of failure

Point to Multi-Point

� Pros

9

� Pros

� Simplicity of design

� Cost effective when tall assets are available

� Cons

� Limited scalability: bandwidth divided by # of subscribers

� LOS required to each subscriber unit

� Base station creates a single point of failure

Multi-Point to Multi-Point (Mesh)

� Pros

10

� Pros

� Reach & scalability with multi-hop connections

� Flexibility – can be deployed a PtP, PtMP or mesh

� Cons

� Variable performance from different vendors

� More complex design vs PtP or PtMP

� Point to point

� Up to 1 Gig+

� Point to multi-point

� 20-30 Mbps total capacity typical (divided by # of subscribers)

� Wireless mesh

What About Throughput?

11

� Wireless mesh

� Can deliver up to 250-300 Mbps in PtP mode or 100-150 Mbps

sustained over multiple hops

� Varies greatly by vendor: from 10-15 Mbps to 100-150 Mbps per

radio

Numbers listed are usable throughput, not theoretical data rate

Deployment Scenario: Mesh & PtP

12

Deployment Scenario: PtMP

13

�District 4

�District 5

Deployment Scenario: Linear Mesh

14

�District1

�District 2

�District 3

�District 4

Not All ‘Wireless Mesh’

Created Equal

15

Created Equal

Imagine a Traditional Wired Switch

Most efficient mesh utilizes L2 distributed wireless switch architecture

16

(Wired Ethernet infrastructure)

Now, Give Each Port Wireless Capability

17

(Wired Ethernet infrastructure)

Separate the Ports…

(Wired Ethernet infrastructure)

Bingo, a Virtual Ethernet Switch!

18

� High throughput

� Low latency < 1.5 ms per hop

� Low packet jitter (variation in latency)

� Support for multicast traffic

� End-to-end QoS & traffic prioritization

Key Requirements for Video

19

� End-to-end QoS & traffic prioritization

� Specialized infrastructure required

� APs not suitable for professional video surveillance

Wi-Fi Access Can Be Useful

� Live video in Wi-Fi ‘hot spots’

� Laptops, PDAs

� Local and remote viewing

20

Wi-Fi enabled

patrol car

Radio, AP & Camera

Mistakes You Can Make

21

ERROR: undefined

OFFENDING COMMAND: ‘~

STACK: