Incidents Have Wider Reach In An Interconnected World
Our interconnected world has made so many things that were once unimaginable a part of our everyday reality. However, our extreme connectedness also means a single disruption can have wide-reaching effects.
Political groups are now taking advantage of the wide-ranging effects that a single incident can have by targeting oil pipelines, power substations, and other critical facilities and points along utility distribution infrastructure. They’re also taking advantage of the 24-hour news cycle by holding protests with increasingly large numbers to get their message heard by a national audience.
In 2022, physical attacks on the United States power grid rose 72% over the year prior. While the COVID-19 pandemic did curtail attacks during 2021, there was still an increase of 20% from 2020 to 2022, including repeated attacks on single sites and coordinated attacks on sites that were geographically clustered together. While the majority of incidents have had no impact on service delivery, an attack utilizing ballistics in Moore County, North Carolina, left 45,000 residents without power for many days. Industry experts anticipate that similar attacks will continue to rise in the future.
Security Teams Require Best-In-Class Surveillance and Communication Equipment
Unprepared security teams can be overwhelmed by these large crowds, unable to disperse them quickly enough to prevent damage and destruction to equipment and infrastructure. To maintain not only the safety of the crowd but the security and integrity of the targeted infrastructure, security teams must be equipped with a detection, surveillance, and communication system that allows them to monitor the situation from a distance while receiving real-time, accurate information that can be acted upon if needed.
Detect
As a large group begins to gather near the restricted area of a high-voltage electric substation, Motorola Solutions’ Avigilon cameras, integrated with Control Center with Unusual Activity Detection motion detectors via Motorola Solutions’ Orchestrate and connected to Motorola’s NITRO 900 MHz LTE private wireless network with infrastructure that includes the LXN 7900 radio access network (RAN) and core, will begin recording and sending notifications to the security team.
Analyze
The security team, receiving real-time alerts from the Avigilon surveillance cameras and Avigilon Control Center with Video Analytics and Appearance Search, will continue monitoring the crowd as they gather and move toward the substation. The placement of the cameras and their 360-degree view means that the entire perimeter of the property will be monitored and recorded.
Communicate
Utilizing Motorola Solutions’ CommandCentral Aware Enterprise and WAVE PTX PTT radios, in conjunction with Avtec Dispatch Software, the security control center is able to dispatch personnel to various locations around the property to ensure there are no perimeter breaches and to deter potential violence or destruction. Avigilon speakers mounted on the cameras can be used to warn intruders that they have been detected and should leave the property immediately. If an intruder breaches the perimeter, security personnel can apprehend them quickly as their location will have been carefully tracked via the cameras and Control Center solution.
Respond
ALLY Incident Management Software will log details with pre-populated fields throughout the incident, while details are relayed directly to local law enforcement via Critical Connect interoperability and CommandCentral Aware. As alerts and alarms are triggered, video is recorded, and teams are dispatched, it will all be logged in the incident report with date and time stamps and supporting video, photographic, voice, or data details so that future investigations and prosecutions have all of the evidence.
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