Network Security must keep up with VSS

The Video Surveillance market in the Middle East region continues to grow in double-digit figures, driven by the rise of security concerns accompanied by strict government regulations. To keep up with the challenges imposed by these concerns and regulations, a reliable, always-on and secure network capable of delivering quality high-resolution videos is imperative to keep organizations safe.

The Middle East is one of the fastest-growing markets for video surveillance systems. Research firm MarketsandMarkets reports that a big driver for the increasing use of video surveillance systems globally is in large part due to the increasing concerns for public safety and security, prompting deployment at airports, malls, schools, office buildings, public places and so on. Nevertheless, the market dynamics are rapidly changing with security cameras being more and more integrated with the IoT architecture to solve for business use cases alongside security use cases, while Artificial Intelligence continues to enable security capabilities related to behaviours and object recognition that have never been possible before. These dynamics are raising the criticality of the video surveillance systems and consequently the criticality of the network infrastructure that interconnects the ecosystem together.

Rabih Itani, the Middle East region security business head at Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company says, “Gone are the days, where the video surveillance networks get the least attention during the design phase, but ironically the first to blame when the video streaming disconnects or suffers jitter or hackers get through. Organizations are beginning to realize the importance of connecting their video surveillance systems to secure and future-proof networks that they can simply trust.”

Aruba understands how to build mission-critical networks, and as such it is aggressively positioning its lifetime warranted Aruba 2930 family of network switches to regional organizations who do take security seriously. Aruba 2930 family solves for current connectivity requirements and prepares for future ones with its smart rate ports, 40Gbps uplink options, and 60W Power-over-Ethernet as mandated by specific devices such as the PTZ cameras. In terms of security, this family of switches furnishes built-in secure-boot hardware and built-in network security capabilities and when additional network edge security and control is needed, these switches integrate bi-directionally with Aruba Clearpass Network Admission Control to authenticate the connecting cameras while authorizing the right access permissions for each. Moreover, Aruba Clearpass Device Insight can be plugged in to leverage Machine Learning in order to accurately profile the connecting devices, while continuously monitoring any profile changes. It is important to note that Aruba can enable the trust to be adaptive, as trust can be revoked at any time based on how devices behave while on the network.

“Video surveillance cameras, which are essentially IoT devices, are a major target themselves for cybercriminals or are used by them as an easy door to access weakly secured networks. This pushes networks to move from being merely a connectivity provider for the cameras, to be first-line defenders. This is where Aruba shines,” concludes Itani.