Artificial Intelligence

If you asked someone about Artificial Intelligence just a few decades ago, they would have no clue about what you were saying. In the late 1990s and the early 2000s, Hollywood helped bring this technological marvel to the forefront with many fiction movies based on the concept of AI. This to a great degree brought about an understanding of AI to the general audience, however, even today when AI has become a very common term, people still aren't exactly sure what exactly it means.

One of the main areas in which AI is playing a pivotal role is that of professional security. Whether that is the digital security of an information system or the perimeter security of a house, AI can solve these problems. In fact, AI can change our approach from passive monitoring to predictive analysis. Combined with the other technologies that we currently have at our disposal, AI can be a game-changer when it comes to enforcing better security and deterring threats.

Machine Learning

At its core AI is designed to do exactly what is inferred by its name, to learn without the intervention of humans and take decisions based on the information that it gathers. While that does sound amazing on its own, it’s not as simple as it seems and there is a bit of work that humans still have to do.

Essentially, there are three kinds of machine learning that we see today.

1. Supervised Learning – when a system receives continuous feedback to it to make a decision
2. Unsupervised Learning – Where decisions are based on information received through statistical data that is received by some input device or source of data
3. Reinforcement Learning – where conditions change based on the information that the system is receiving as well as the pre-programmed rules that have been set in place for the system.

These systems are being used in physical and virtual security systems with a lot of success. For instance, facial recognition, intelligent AI surveillance cameras, video redaction, and IoT-enabled security sensors, to name a few. While in the past people were not too inclined towards these solutions due to their price they are much more popular now as they are cheaper and people see the value in having really good security.

Moreover, the ongoing pandemic has also worsened the situation and people are looking for an effective way to protect their assets as well as good health safety solutions. These forms of security help eliminate the interaction between people and can in fact to quite a degree reduce the need for humans altogether so these systems are definitely coming in handy in many different situations.

AI Security In Action

Some of the major functions of AI-based security systems today include:

• Automatically identifying, tracking, and authenticating individuals as soon as they enter an area
• Highlighting individuals who are not wearing a mask in a zone where people have to wear masks
• Automatically checking the body temperature of people that are within the view of the camera
• Automatically restricting these individuals or redirecting these people who are not complying with regulations or those that pose a threat
• Blurring out faces of people who do not need to be shown in a video
• Creating a transcript or subtitles for a video
• Scanning the environment for unusual behavior or any other physical signs that may require further attention.

These are only some of the things that AI-powered security systems are now able to do. It is quite clear with the speed of development in the field of AI that the scope of this technology is far beyond just creating safety solutions for the pandemic. Moreover, as this technology gets cheaper and more manufacturers incorporate AI into their products we will be seeing a lot more of this technology around us serving the role of more advanced and more intelligent security.