The National Capital Region closed circuit television video interoperability project

Objective: The National Capital Region (NCR) includes many government jurisdictions and agencies using different closed circuit TV (CCTV) cameras and video management software. Because these agencies often must work together to respond to emergencies and events, a means of providing interoperability for CCTV video is critically needed. Design: Video data from different CCTV systems that are not inherently interoperable is represented in the “data layer.” An “integration layer” ingests the data layer source video and normalizes the different video formats. It then aggregates and distributes this video to a “presentation layer” where it can be viewed by almost any application used by other agencies and without any proprietary software. A native mobile video viewing application is also developed that uses the presentation layer to provide video to different kinds of smartphones. Setting: The NCR includes Washington, DC, and surrounding counties in Maryland and Virginia. Results: The video sharing architecture allows one agency to see another agency's video in their native viewing application without the need to purchase new CCTV software or systems. A native smartphone application was also developed to enable them to share video via mobile devices even when they use different video management systems. Conclusions: A video sharing architecture has been developed for the NCR that creates an interoperable environment for sharing CCTV video in an efficient and cost effective manner. In addition, it provides the desired capability of sharing video via a native mobile application.