I have read with interest several articles about the concept of rapidly deployable CCTV. I have been researching this area on and off for quite some time now.
For many years, I have been involved in the proactive and reactive protection of critical national infrastructure from higher and lower levels of criminal proficiency. This effort has ranged from designing comprehensive, multimillion-pound physical/electronic security systems to combating the metal theft epidemic, the poor behaviour of site users, and everything in between. The rapid deployment of CCTV in response to an incident has always caused me issues. Power and/or communications are either not available or in the wrong place.
Operational requirements
I really like operational requirements. I use them all the time, both as an overview and for the details, so I constructed one for this concept, summarised below:
A single unit incorporating a camera, detection, infrared, SIM, SD card, batteries, and the aerial that is easy to install on pretty much anything — buildings, poles, trees, etc.
The ability to connect wirelessly to remote detection and remote infrared, plus interchangeable lenses for longer-distance monitoring
SIMs that use a private cellular network and roam between differing networks to ensure coverage with encrypted and time-stamped images of at least VGA standard
Onboard battery power that would last at least three weeks; I used an arbitrary 12 activations per day recording 10 seconds of video and transmitting three images per activation as the criteria, but with options to attach small solar panels for longer life or even semi-permanent deployment
I’m looking for multiple deployments, so I didn’t want these images just dropping into email inboxes — though that’s obviously a very useful function, especially for those responding. I wanted an overall software platform that could either be used independently or alternatively integrated into an overall site or multi-site security solution platform.
I think you will agree that’s quite an ask, especially my battery life requirements, which are absolutely crucial to make the solution truly rapidly deployable. Most products I came across appeared to require power or had backup battery power that would last around 72 hours.