Security system to track ownerless luggage

Australian scientists are developing a computer surveillance system that can identify a derelict suitcase at a crowded airport and tell what happens to the person who abandoned it.

Designers hope the system will one day allow security forces to distinguish a suspected abandoned suitcase (whose owner has left the area) with a suitcase that the owner owns. just hanging around in the coffee drinking area 2 meters away.

Assistant Professor Massimo Piccardi, from University of Technology Sydney and colleagues will work with iOmniscient monitoring company to improve the company's monitoring system.

IOmniscient's technology uses software with security cameras that can distinguish an unfamiliar static object - such as a suitcase - from another familiar scene. The monitoring system will alert security personnel to check whether the leftover is intentional or not.

This technology is currently used to track airports and other buildings around the world, including Australia. However, Piccardi says its current prototype is not very good at distinguishing between static objects that are really suspicious with ordinary objects. And that means that security personnel are often alarmed.

Piccardi and the team plan to develop tracking technology to allow the system to determine whether the owner of the item (or suitcase) moves away from the area after removing the object.

" We will follow them while they are walking and learn about the relationship with the objects they carry ," he said. " The alarm will only vibrate in case the object is left behind and the person carrying it leaves the area ".

Piccardi admits that this goal is " ambitious " because tracking someone with surveillance technology is a long-standing challenge and now it only works exactly when the viewing area is not crowded. If there are too many people, and this person is hidden behind others, the cameras will be very difficult to follow them.

However, Piccardi said his team has developed a technique to identify people who appear on the camera abruptly as when they disappear and show up behind others.

Piccardi also intends to create a list of certain potentially safe objects, such as wheelchairs for the disabled and airport carts. " But if someone left the suitcase in a wheelchair, the suitcase could be as dangerous as the suitcase left on the floor, " he said. The monitoring system will use geometry, color and contrast to determine if the wheelchair is really empty, and if there is any doubt, the security system will be alerted.

T. An ( by ABConline )