Latin America. Sporting events, concerts, artistic-cultural festivals, marches of social and political movements, all constitute highly complex mass events for the authorities responsible for public order, the police agencies and the organizers themselves. As can be seen from the latest episodes of violence, security in stadiums is particularly worrying.
Both in stadiums and in open venues such as parks or avenues, the common challenge is to ensure the safety of participating individuals, the integrity of infrastructure and public goods. For both cases, new technologies already allow to prevent events that constitute a potential risk such as accidents, violence, theft or loss of people, in order to take the right measures at the right time.
Particularly, some stadiums in the United States and Europe have modernized their facilities to digitize their video surveillance, access control and audio systems, becoming true Digital Stadiums.
The accuracy and quality of the image that is captured and obtained with these systems, regardless of the adverse variables that arise, such as low luminosity, the complexity of the viewing angles, the weather, suspicious movements and many other details that occur, are no longer an obstacle for these increasingly intelligent devices, precise and highly adaptable.
Analytics help control the flow of spectators in a stadium and allow you to proactively prevent the eruption of violence. For example, using facial recognition to identify people with a history of bad behavior and preventing their entry into the stadium, or recognizing VIP customers to treat them accordingly.
In fact, what stadium managers want is to be able to control the flow of fans entering the stadium, identifying potential vandals before they can cause damage. It is also possible to receive alerts from the arrival of people or vehicles in restricted areas, or when suspicious objects are abandoned. You can also monitor the video through an app, live, from any device, including smartphones and tablets. PTZ cameras can also be controlled from any of those devices.
For stadium managers, the image quality of their video surveillance system is critical after the event, when the team uses the footage for investigations. Additionally, digital stadium cameras with 4K Ultra HD resolution allow athletes and coaches to analyze recordings of their actions easily, visualizing every second and every detail to improve their performance.
Generally, there are many variables to visualize, from the access control and identification of the attendees, their behavior during the event, to the exits and the connection, for example with the transport services, to avoid congestion and alterations in the traffic that affect the city.
The value of the analysis
Having a monitoring center, along with providing electronic eyes to capture all movements and changes in the behavior of the audience, constitutes the brain and the nerve center to deploy information that allows interoperability and collaboration between the different entities such as police, first aid, firefighters, civil defense or transport.
Additionally, with the implementation of analytical systems -such as facial recognition or movement control- the entry and identification of people is facilitated as a preventive and also dissuasive way.
A successful implementation case was concretized jointly between the Municipality and the police of Turin in Italy, which initiated a pilot project of video surveillance based on an IP network infrastructure for events in public spaces that involved three central axes and that was put to the test during the visit of Pope Francis to the city.
The system had functionalities such as biometric scanning for facial recognition of the individuals who attended the event, and video analysis to carry out a study of the evolution and changes in the crowd, establishing patterns that allowed post-event simulations with the highest levels of accuracy and reliability.
All of the above was complemented by a rapid deployment system based on wireless transmission hosted in the Cloud, which could be viewed from a central where the flow of images was integrated and managed in real time. The result: the organizers had a powerful online video surveillance system, advanced and intelligent to proactively detect and prevent any incident, with the ability to identify those responsible for illegal acts to be arrested at the right place and time, to be brought to justice. All this, while guaranteeing the normal development of this multitudinous and festive event of great relevance for the city and its inhabitants.
For families who, out of fear, stopped participating in large public events or going to stadiums for football matches or other entertainment events, it is important to clarify that technology is in their favor, and that the experience of other stadiums around the world points to the possibility of prohibiting access by individuals who have a history of violence or criminality, and for the possibility of enjoying a safe experience in those environments.
Text written by Rodrigo Sanchez, Sales Engineer at Axis Communications.
