Video Surveillance Joins Blackboard Commerce Suite
Ed tech developer Blackboard this week launched a new video surveillance solution for its campus management system called Blackboard Video Surveillance. The new tool, announced at the BbWorld Commerce conference in Phoenix, AZ March 10, will become part of the Blackboard Commerce Suite, a payment and security management system designed for higher ed.
The announcement comes on the heels of of Blackboard's acquisition of NTI Group, a security software company that provides emergency notification tools.
According to Blackboard Commerce President Russ Carlson, "Universities have historically had to conduct separate evaluations for the various components of campus security, ultimately implementing technology from multiple vendors and performing their own system integrations. With the addition of video surveillance to our existing access control and mass notification capabilities, Blackboard now has a complete security offering. Our mass notification and video surveillance solutions take advantage of recent advances in technology. Mass notification is moving from text-based to multi-modal communication, which has shown to be more reliable and effective. Video surveillance is moving from analog cameras to cameras based on standard internet protocols, which allows campuses to manage the system using the same network, server infrastructure, and management techniques already in place for their other enterprise applications."
Blackboard Video Surveillance integrates with the Commerce Suite and provides support for recorded and live video from up to 80 cameras simultaneously, motion detection and event triggering, automatic electronic notification (e-mail, text, etc.), zooming, customizable views, and frame by frame playback. It's compatible with surveillance cameras from 30 manufacturers.
Further information can be found here.