Posts Tagged ‘easy’

Gain situational awareness in just a few minutes

Providing up-to-date information to the right people at the right time has always been a fundamental driver of telecommunications technology. With Meraki MV security cameras it is exceptionally easy to provide situational awareness to first responders in emergency situations.

Due to its cloud architecture and browser-based interface, the MV system allows any number of police officers or firefighters access to video from any device with a modern web browser. This ability to gain situational awareness in just a few minutes can have a big impact on public safety when a crisis occurs.

Four major attributes of MV’s functionality enable this capability. The first is the automatic delivery of video to remote viewers through the cloud. This automatic cloud stream is dynamically created when the Meraki dashboard detects the user’s device can’t connect directly to the camera for instance, from outside of the building. This secure encrypted video delivery eliminates the need for a VPN and the associated complex configuration.

Spencer Data Flow and Storage

The Meraki cloud will automatically detect whether the viewing computer is in the same network as the cameras, sending video directly or proxying through the cloud.

The second is that because the cloud acts as a proxy for the video coming from the MV cameras, video is only streamed once from the camera to the cloud but many times from the cloud to the clients. This allows the system to scale in an emergency to allow for many first responders to have access to video simultaneously. This happens automatically and dynamically with no pre-planning or configuration required.

Spencer Data Flow and Storage - RemoteVideo streams once from the cameras to the cloud, but can stream to multiple remote computers simultaneously.

Thirdly, the implementation of HLS for video transport means video can stream to any device with a modern web browser. In an emergency situation all you need is access to an Internet-connected device and a web browser: no special computer, no software to install, and no wasted time.

dashboard_on_your_phone

Finally, comprehensive access controls allow for login and video viewing privileges to only be assigned to those who should have them. These privileges can be integrated with existing user databases with Meraki’s support for SAML, or new access can be provisioned directly within a couple of minutes with just a user’s email address.

mv_user_accounts_small2

Combined, Meraki MV’s features offer a new level of capability and customizability when it comes to public safety. When making the right decision is paramount, the value of having rapid access to the right information cannot be overestimated. Contact us today to find out more about MV and to arrange a trial to test the technology for yourself.

Sentry WiFi Security

In June we announced Systems Manager Sentry, a set of features which provide simple, automatic security that is context aware. It can do this due to the integration between the Meraki networking products and Systems Manager.

Sentry Wi-Fi security is a feature enabled on Meraki MR wireless networks with Systems Manager. It takes the typically complex Wi-Fi access control method, EAP-TLS, and simplifies it to a couple of clicks.

sentry_wifi_sec_user

To understand the power of this feature let’s quickly review Extensible Authentication Protocol (EAP) – Transport Layer Security (TLS). EAP is an authentication framework that is used for providing access to a network. As the extensible part of the EAP acronym implies, the framework can support multiple authentication protocols, from basic passwords to more secure certificate based authentication. Think of it as a cook book for a cake. Depending on the ingredients in the recipe you end up with a different cake, but still a cake.

EAP with Transport Layer Security (TLS) is considered one of the most secure network authentication mechanisms (the tastiest cake recipe). This is because it uses certificates to authenticate and secure the network connection using asymmetric cryptography. The problem with certificates, as an ingredient of this authentication mechanism, is that they are complex to setup and deploy.

complex_certificate

There are two main reasons certificates can be complex to setup and deploy. The first is the infrastructure that is needed, something called a certificate authority. This issues the certificates and allows devices to check if a service is genuine. The second reason is that every client needs its own unique certificate. With a handful of clients this isn’t too much work, but with hundreds of thousands of clients this could be a daunting prospect. The tastiest cake results from a bake time of weeks or months, and looks less attractive as a result.

Sentry Wi-Fi security provides EAP-TLS for a Meraki MR wireless network while eliminating all the complexity. It can do this because of the certificate infrastructure that already exists for every Systems Manager customer. This eliminates the need for the configuration of a certificate authority and distribution of certificates to clients. A gourmet cake from an
instant-bake ready-mix pack.

cake
Make deploying EAP-TLS a piece of cake with Systems Manager Sentry. To find out more listen to Paul Wolfe (Product Specialist for Systems Manager) and George Bentinck (Solutions Architect) discuss Sentry Wi-Fi security in the following podcast. Alternatively attend one of our upcoming Systems Manager webinars, or if you already have Meraki MR access points, try Sentry out today by signing up for Systems Manager.