Commercial Integrator + Security Sales April 2024 - 46

MONITORING MATTERS by Peter Giacalone
AI, Analytics and Machine Learning:
What Are the Diff erences?
OVER THE PAST FEW YEARS
- and especially this past year -
the term " AI " has become one of the
most discussed (and possibly most
misunderstood) of our time.
Artifi cial intelligence, or AI for short,
has had a lot of hype on so many levels
and on countless channels. Given the
stated power of the new capabilities that
its use enables, it is no wonder that so
many are compelled to learn more and
even engage.
Because of all this buzz, it's oſt en
hard to diff erentiate what's real from
what's not. Every company nowadays
claims to have some sort of AI. But what
does it mean for the security industry?
At the highest level, there are two
main types of AI: " Narrow AI " (an AI
that is trained to solve one specifi c
problem as accurately as possible) and
" General AI " (an AI that can solve any
generic problem and can think critically
and reason about any topic like a
human would).
Almost All of the AI
Applications are Narrow AI
All mainstream applications of AI today
are Narrow AI, no matter how much
they may look like General AI.
For example, ChatGPT can take any
variety of available tools, we can generate
pictures of some really strange
things that don't actually exist.
There are also some really important
applications of Narrow AI in the
security industry.
Particularly
Compelling Applications
Here are a few security industry
applications that are particularly
compelling:
Facial Recognition in Video: This
Because of all the
buzz, it's often hard
to diff erentiate
what's real from
what's not. Every
company nowadays
claims to have some
sort of AI. But what
does it mean for the
security industry?
written textual input and generate
human-like text responses to the
prompt. However, ChatGPT is a subclass
of AI called " Generative AI, " which is trained on an input dataset
(i.e., all text that humans have written on the internet) and
taught to do a specifi c task (i.e., respond to a text input with a
relevant text output).
ChatGPT appears at fi rst glance to be General AI but lacks
the generic reasoning necessary to garner that distinction.
Instead, it's most accurately classifi ed as Narrow AI.
As of today, a true General AI has yet to be created. However,
we have been able to solve a lot of real-world problems
with Narrow AI. Internet search is amazingly accurate; your
navigation directions and ETA to destination are accurate
within minutes; self-driving cars are starting to reach a
threshold of being nearly as safe as (or even safer than)
human drivers; and, perhaps most importantly, through a
is, to date, one of the best applications
of narrow AI in the security industry.
As of today, it still has some key
real-world limitations, but we expect
improvements to continue to open
new opportunities for its application.
Object Recognition in Video:
Having a computer " watch " a video
and be able to identify which specifi c
objects are in the video (e.g., animal,
person, vehicle, weapon/gun, open
door, closed door, fi re, smoke) is an
extremely valuable capability for
security.
Optical Character Recognition
(OCR) in Photos and Video: Being
able to tell from a photo what text is
in the fi eld of view (i.e., being able
to automatically read a license plate)
has been revolutionary for many
security applications.
Considering Audio Recognition
Speaker/Voice Recognition in Audio: This opens the door
to many interesting applications. Speech-to-text has existed
for quite a while, but some companies are making advancements
in their capacity to detect who is spewaking based on
their voice.
■ Detection and identifi cation of common sounds (e.g., the
ability to automatically detect a gunshot, glass breaking
or another event of interest that emits a lot of sound) is
hugely powerful.
■ Interestingly, many voice-recognition platforms and
facial-recognition platforms face many of the same challenges
(e.g., accuracy of the technology, privacy concerns,
(Continued on page 48) ▸
46 Commercial Integrator+Security Sales & Integration | April 2024
SHUO/STOCK.ADOBE.COM
Commercial Integrator + Security Sales April 2024

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