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by Dave Gradijan

California Railways Install Wi-Fi and Security Cameras

News
Jul 11, 20062 mins
CSO and CISOData and Information Security

Commuter rail projects, managed by the San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District and CCJPA, will start new security initiatives—which may include security cameras in all cars and Wi-Fi surveillance monitoring, Security Director News (SDN) reports.

“The primary driving force behind both installations is passenger safety,” Jim Allison, Capitol Corridor Joint Powers Authority project planner, told SDN.

The first initiative will install cameras on 78 trains, in eight counties from Sacramento to San Francisco, the article reports. Within a year, the authority hopes to have four to six internal cameras and two external cameras on each car. The recorded images will be kept in a box on individual trains, stored for “instance-based” review, when necessary, and converted with an IP address.

Security Director News states the second initiative, a broadband services solution, will provide networked and perhaps intelligent video surveillance on cars in transit. It will also allow passengers and operators to access virtual private networks, high-speed video and audio streaming, laptop and e-mail access, and PDA and cell phone service on moving trains.

The ultimate aim of both projects is to provide real-time monitoring through the cameras once they are looped into the networked system, Allison told SDN. Then using video analytics, conductors or the local police who monitor the rail stations could be alerted to stationary objects or trespassers in cars, at platforms or even in equipment storage yards.

Compiled by Paul Kerstein

For more information on surveillance, read CSO’s Video Surveillance Field Guide.

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