Do your CCTV cameras really protect your assets?
Nowadays, everyone is installing CCTV cameras not only for their commercial properties but also for their residential properties. Because it seems everyone thinks installing CCTV cameras will protect their assets. Do CCTV cameras will really protect your assets?
Read the below story published in TOI about gold ornaments’ theft incidents in a jewelry showroom in which CCTV cameras did not prevent the theft.
AHMEDABAD: In yet another case of theft from a jewelry showroom, a man and a woman, aged around 25 years, along with a 4-year-old child, visited a store in the Panchvati area of the city as customers on October 24, saw some gold rings and later replaced a real gold ring worth Rs 36,574 with a fake one.
According to an FIR registered with Ellisbridge police, the couple had asked the staff to show some gold rings.
A staffer Zeel Padhiyar was showing them gold rings. At that time, they replaced the original gold ring weighing 740 milligrams with a fake one. The incident has been captured on CCTV.
The staffers came to know about the theft the next day. A police official said, “An employee went to the branch manager and told him that one of the gold rings is fake. After that, the branch manager checked CCTV footage and found that the family had stolen the gold ring.”
This is the second case of theft in the same jewelry showroom in recent times. On August 3, a woman, aged around 40, had visited the showroom, saw some gold bangles, and stole two gold bangles worth Rs 1.57 lakh.
When the Ellisbridge police were still unsuccessful to detect the case, another theft took place in the same showroom. Ellisbridge police again registered a case of theft and began an investigation into the issue.
Source: TOI
In the above case, Did the CCTV really prevent theft? No.
Did CCTV work as a deterrent? No.
Did the CCTV record the incident? Yes…but, the business owner, had lost their assets and no guarantee police will trace them.
In addition to the loss of gold ornaments, the showroom has lost employee productivity and gained terrible publicity, which is detrimental to the business. Then have you ever puzzled what the actual use of CCTV cameras is?
In general, the CCTV cameras have three main uses in Physical Security System Design:
1. To know what is happening at the moment through live monitoring
2. To understand what has happened through video recording review (very helpful during incident investigations/periodic audits/law enforcement/court proceedings)
3. Act as a deterrence tool
The CCTV (Closed Circuit Television) cameras are one of the Electronic Security Measures in many physical security measures. The CCTV cameras in isolation cannot provide complete physical security protection.
How could the CCTV cameras have prevented the theft incident from happening in the jewelry showroom case?
1. The CCTV cameras need live monitoring by a dedicated security team/CCTV operations To prevent a theft incident from happening.
2. The recorded CCTV footage can be verified to know how an incident has occurred and only useful to investigate an incident. But this is not useful in the businesses where the value of assets is high such as the jewelry showrooms.
3. The CCTV cameras can deter the criminal – but does not work in case of a determined/organized criminal
What mistakes did the business owner make in this case?
• The jewelry store owner assumed that installing the CCTV can protect their assets.
• Perhaps he/she got their CCTV installation done by a CCTV supplier/Technician without understanding the actual security threats
• Did not carry out a site security assessment, which gives real security threats and recommendations of various mitigation measures along with CCTV cameras and exact location of where to install, what types of cameras, for maximum scene identification.
If your objective, like many businesses, is for loss prevention, you got to have a dedicated team to monitor the CCTV cameras without which it does not solve your problem. In the jewelry showroom theft incident, this is what exactly happened.
First, you got to understand why are you installing the CCTV cameras, whether to prevent an incident (high-value assets-needs ‘live monitoring of CCTV cameras), or to investigate (low-value assets).
Never get your CCTV cameras installed directly by the CCTV installers/equipment suppliers without a review by security experts. If you do, you will be another victim like the jewelry showroom owner.
Because the physical security system design is a specialist job, and only expert security professionals can do justice, not everyone.
Get your site physical security design/CCTV installation plan reviewed by our Security experts. Our security experts have internationally recognized credentials and decades of experience in Security Risk Management and provided security solutions to fortune 500 companies.
Remember! Your CCTV installation by the CCTV installers/equipment suppliers not only wastes your money but also does not solve your security problems.
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