Durrant Security Designer Discusses IP Conundrum

Fairbourn

PHOENIX — Although Internet protocol cameras have the potential to improve security measures at correctional facilities, the technology is still too new for justice facilities, according to Richard Fairbourn, a security designer with Durrant’s Phoenix office.

“There is a big tidal wave in the industry right now of advocates for IP cameras,” Fairbourn says. “IP cameras have their place, but as far as Durrant is concerned, it is not in the justice market, where there is security involving people in custody.”

Fairbourn says the push for IP cameras in the correctional market comes from manufacturers and integrators who are looking to make a profit off the technology. He says only 10 percent of the security market is using IP cameras and less than 1 percent of justice facilities have the technology.

“It’s so software driven, it is extremely volatile,” Fairbourn says. “We are not ready to expose our clients as research-and-development facilities. We would like the technology to standardize a little bit and prove its reliability and durability.”

IP cameras first came on the market during the mid-1990s, but because the technology is evolving so quickly, no specific application has been in use for more than two or three years, Fairbourn says.

“It’s an evolving market,” Fairbourn says. “A system that came out in 1994 looks like a jalopy compared to the ones that are coming out now.”