ISTANBUL, Turkey--May 10, 2006--Cisco Systems today announced it is providing the network routing and contact centre technology behind MOBESE (Mobile Electronic Systems Integration), an innovative city information and security system that is helping the Istanbul Police Department keep watch over potential incident spots around Turkey's largest city.
In the first phase of the MOBESE project, 700 surveillance cameras have been positioned at strategic points around the city. These are connected via DSL links provided by Turk Telecom to a Cisco network with multicast capabilities, where images can be analyzed by a range of software applications, such as license plate recognition and police vehicle tracking systems. The network also supports an IP contact centre that allows calls to be matched to images coming live from the scene of an incident.
MOBESE is a total city information and security system implemented with the support of the Governorship of Istanbul. The system is comprised of 12 components, including command and control, vehicle tracing, license plate recognition and district services automation in addition to the video surveillance capability. MOBESE, with an infrastructure connecting more than 9000 end points, is an excellent example where a number of communications technologies have been implemented over a single intelligent information network.
"This is the first time we have used video surveillance and we were keen to use technologies that were tried and tested in this field," said Halit Korken, deputy CIO of the Istanbul Police Department. "Cisco was able to prove that it understood our requirements and had experience with similar deployments in other countries. We expect MOBESE to make a significant contribution to Istanbul's safety and are already planning to extend the project across the city."
The MOBESE project has already provided measurable benefits to the Istanbul Police. For example, a large number of stolen vehicles have been traced over MOBESE, enabling officers to be more responsive. By mapping more incidents to video footage, car thieves are starting to get the 'picture.' Officers have also become more productive because of efficiency in communications between offices, police centers, police cars and mobile stations, which allows them to spend more time on crime prevention.
At the heart of the MOBESE network is the Cisco Intelligent Information Network that intelligently directs, recognises and routes video traffic from the 700 Sanyo cameras to the command and control centre. The network uses the 12000 Series router platform, Cisco LAN switching and Cisco IP telephony elements and a Cisco IP Contact Centre (IPCC).
"Creating IP-based surveillance networks has a host of benefits in terms of assuring emergency services can respond in a commensurate fashion to events unfolding during an incident," said Alper Erdal, Account Manager. "The scalability of Cisco platforms means that it is easy to extend projects, such as MOBESE, to provide information streams to other emergency services departments or to add data centre functionality which can help in collecting critical information."
