From Reactive to Proactive: Transform Security With AI Video Analytics 

Businesses face an ever-evolving landscape of threats to personnel and property. Traditional surveillance has been long weighed down by systems with limited capabilities, with minimal search and alerting capabilities making it difficult to investigate and respond during critical incidents. These systems can cost operators valuable time and resources, while simultaneously leaving people and assets vulnerable to threats. Because of this, organizations need preventive capabilities to increase the overall security of their businesses so their employees, customers, and students can feel safer while on premises. 

Industry leaders are asking key questions as they seek solutions built to enhance security, including: 

• How can we shift our security posture from reactive monitoring to proactive response? 

• What technologies will allow our security teams to identify and deter suspicious behavior before it escalates? 

• How can we leverage AI to automate alerts and reduce response times? 

• What methods does AI offer for streamlining investigations? 

• How do we optimize security operations across multiple locations? 

• How can modernizing our surveillance platform help safeguard our assets more reliably? 

To answer these questions, businesses can turn to AI-powered, cloud-managed video security. AI video analytics in a cloud surveillance platform are transforming reactive systems into proactive security solutions. These capabilities offer powerful ways to detect suspicious or potentially criminal incidents through loitering, intrusion, line crossing, license plate recognition (LPR), and other analytic types. Paired with additional tools, including active deterrence solutions, cloud surveillance systems can help teams surface relevant video more quickly and react faster in the moments that matter most to safeguard people and assets.

Identifying the Threats to Organizations’ Security

Organizations across industries face numerous issues which impact the overall security of their business. External theft cost the retail industry $45 billion in revenue during 2024, almost $3 billion more than the previous year. Over seventy percent of public schools reported one or more incidents of violence, theft, or other crimes each year, amounting to 1.4 million crimes on average. Financial institutions saw over 1,200 robberies committed in the U.S., with the majority of those taking place at branch offices. 

For businesses and organizations struggling with crime, identifying and discouraging suspicious activity before it escalates is key. Below, we look at some of the most troublesome areas and situations where teams often struggle to enforce effective security around facilities and campuses, including: 

• Tracking loitering across multiple locations 

• Ensuring restricted areas are secured against unauthorized access 

• Barred vehicles entering properties 

• Difficulty surfacing video relevant to incident investigations 

Suspicious Loitering Around Facilities 

Loitering can be a precursor to criminal activity such as theft, vandalism, or trespassing. Even if the loitering doesn’t result in suspicious activity, the presence of individuals lingering around a property can create a sense of unease for employees and surrounding businesses. This was the case with business owners and citizens in District Heights, Maryland, where the rising numbers of loiterers in parking lots caused concern as well as frustration that trash was left behind in parking lots. Facility perimeters, parking garages, and entrances are common high-risk zones where suspicious presence often goes undetected until it escalates.

Security teams face the challenge of distinguishing between benign activity, such as a visitor taking a phone call, and suspicious behavior potentially tied to criminal intent. Having to maintain constant visual oversight across multiple locations, especially in high-traffic environments, is both labor-intensive and prone to human error. The result is often delayed intervention or missed opportunities to prevent incidents.

Unauthorized Access to Restricted Areas 

Restricted areas within your buildings are areas that also need constant vigilance, whether that’s protecting against internal theft or an intruder entering your property. Server rooms, stocking areas, manufacturing lines, executive offices, and other sensitive locations require solutions designed to alert on entry.

To mitigate any losses caused by unauthorized access, businesses need intelligent solutions which can quickly alert staff to persons entering restricted areas. This enables faster incident response and streamlines investigations to provide a more secure location.

Difficulty Tracking Known Vehicles 

Known persons or vehicles that are barred from entering your business present a unique security challenge. Traditional surveillance offers limited capabilities to quickly identify and track these vehicles, which can slow down response times and put people and assets in potential danger. 

Having to constantly watch for these vehicles isn’t feasible and manually scanning license plate numbers when reviewing hours of video during investigations is also incredibly labor intensive. This approach delays response times and makes it difficult to prevent future incidents, once again creating the need for a solution that can identify and alert on known vehicles for improved business security. 

Slow Investigations Due to Legacy Search Methods 

Video surveillance systems can present challenges when it comes to reviewing and responding to incidents. Locating specific events within recorded footage often requires manually scanning through extended periods of video, which can be time-consuming in situations where a quick response is needed. 

Without advanced analytics, teams must rely on manual video review, which impedes identification of critical incidents and suspicious activities, often resulting in overlooked details and delayed reactions. 

How AI-Powered Video Analytics Strengthens Security 

To combat loitering, strengthen access control within designated areas, track unauthorized vehicles entering your property, and streamline investigations into incidents, businesses can leverage AI-powered video analytics in a cloud video platform to assist as you secure your business. 

These advanced tools offer capabilities including: 

• Loitering and intrusion detection 

• AI-powered visual alerting and search 

• Line crossing analytics 

• LPR detection 

• Attribute filters 

• Similarity search 

• Integrated third-party analytics 

Additionally, active deterrence solutions, including powerful white-light cameras, help your team set up a layered defensive network to streamline the operations of your security teams and ensure only the most pressing situations are sent to your organization for review. 

Faster Identification of Suspicious Activity 

Loitering and intrusion detection is an intelligent method for monitoring defined zones and being quickly alerted to prolonged or repeated presence of persons in these areas. When a threshold is crossed, AI recognizes the event and sends out a push notification to a team member. This enables your security department to discourage unwanted activity in these areas and react more quickly if a crime is committed. 

AI-powered visual alerting provides an easy and proactive method for setting up additional alerts to avoid incidents; for example, alerts can be set to notify based on if an exit has objects blocking it so staff can be dispatched to remedy the safety issue. These unique parameters are determined by security operators, so teams can stay informed of situations that represent a compliance issue or are potentially suspicious. When an alert is sent out, it will include a short, AI-generated summary alongside reference images. Leveraging these alerts automates visual verification for faster confirmation of whether important security conditions have been met, as well as operational and marketing conditions. 

Active deterrence solutions provide another powerful layer of security along perimeters and other key outdoor areas. Active deterrent cameras discourage suspicious or unwanted behavior with automatic white light and audio playback activation triggered by alerts tied to analytic events. When used in conjunction with multi-region alerts, active deterrence serves as the first line of defense, creating a layered security approach that ensures events are only escalated when necessary. 

Together, these solutions help secure vulnerable areas and protect against criminal activity. Instead of waiting for an incident to be discovered manually, security teams receive instant, actionable alerts and can collaborate with law enforcement to intervene, stopping crime before it occurs. 

Proactive Response to Unauthorized Access 

Line crossing analytics bring higher precision to access control monitoring. By creating virtual boundaries within a camera’s field of view, such as a doorway, hallway, or warehouse section, security teams can receive alerts triggered by AI detection if someone enters a restricted area. 

This technology enables faster recognition of unauthorized entries, enabling response before intruders can cause harm or access sensitive assets. In facilities where safety hazards are present, such as manufacturing floors or chemical storage areas, this proactive detection can prevent accidents and strengthen compliance, keeping your team members safe and your property protected. 

Better Tracking of Known Vehicles

LPR analytics automate the identification and tracking of vehicles entering or leaving a property. Cameras capture plate information and produce alerts when matches are found, allowing businesses to preemptively monitor for threats. This could be in cases where a vehicle belongs to an individual with a history of misconduct, a delivery truck entering restricted zones without authorization, or a suspicious vehicle lingering near the premises. 

Once a situation has been recognized and an alert received, team members can collaborate and share video with law enforcement to ensure the criminal is apprehended or person discouraged from entering the property. 

Fast-Tracked Investigations With Intelligent Search 

AI-powered cloud surveillance combines user-friendly intelligent search tools alongside integrated third-party analytics to streamline investigations.  

Features such as attribute filters and similarity search enable users to search for objects or people by unique identifiers such as clothing color or vehicle make across multiple cameras, replacing hours of manual review with fast, precise results. Additionally, AI-powered visual search is another key feature that leverages natural-language queries to quickly locate video. For example, a person can search “Person wearing a backpack,” and all video of individuals that match said description will be surfaced.  

Beyond attribute filters, similarity search, and visual search, a complete cloud video surveillance platform can search on additional analytic types, such as loitering and line cross detection. An open cloud surveillance platform will also be able to integrate with third-party analytics, enabling access to a greater range of AI software and hardware.

Fortify Security With OpenEye’s Advanced Video Analytics

The shift from reactive to proactive hinges on advanced, intelligent security. As unique challenges continue to affect industries, from education to retail to banking and beyond, organizations need to adopt solutions that can help them better protect people and assets. These solutions must also streamline security operations, ensuring response is not only prompt but also more accurate and coordinated. AI-powered analytics and cloud video solutions help solve the challenges of traditional surveillance systems, empowering organizations with greater visibility, faster incident response, streamlined investigations, and fortified business security. 

OpenEye’s open, intelligent, and trusted cloud video platform equips businesses with AI-powered video analytics and active deterrence solutions designed to improve response times and strengthen safety. OpenEye Web Services’ (OWS) AI Visual Check proactively monitors camera feeds and delivers intelligent alerts across a diverse range of clients, enabling faster response. AI Visual Search lets you locate specific moments in your video footage by simply describing what you’re looking for in plain language, turning what used to take hours into seconds. 

OWS also offers additional AI-powered analytics, including Attribute Filters and Similarity Search, loitering, intrusion, line crossing, LPR detection, and integrated third-party analytics, all within a remote, centralized surveillance platform. Active Deterrence in OWS strengthens security by discouraging unwanted behavior before it escalates. This is accomplished through OpenEye cameras equipped with audio playback or white light illumination, which can automatically activate in response to configured alerts to draw attention to suspicious activity and help reduce incidents as they occur. 

To learn more about OpenEye’s advanced video analytics and how they can strengthen the security of your business, book an OWS demo today.