On January 28th, Criminals No Longer Another Face in the Tampa Stadium Crowd

Matthew Gaylor freematt at coil.com
Thu Feb 1 01:31:49 PST 2001


http://www.viisage.com/january_29_2001.htm

Press Releases | News About Viisage

GRAPHCO TECHNOLOGIES, INC. Provides Surveillance for Raymond James 
Stadium to Identify Known Suspects, Deter Crime

On January 28th, Criminals No Longer Another Face in the Tampa Stadium Crowd

Tampa, Florida, January 29, 2001 -Graphco Technologies, Inc. (G-TEC), 
a leading developer of technology and solutions for biometric 
authentication, secure access, and expert information-sharing 
systems, announced today that they provided a surveillance and facial 
recognition system at both the Raymond James Stadium in Tampa and at 
Ybor City, Florida. The system was in place from January 21 - January 
28, 2001 to monitor potential criminal activities during the sporting 
events and related activities at the two locations.

In cooperation with the Tampa Sports Authority, Graphco Technologies 
partnered with Raytheon Company's (NYSE: RTNA, RTNB) Linthicum, 
Maryland office, Viisage Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ: VISG), and VelTek 
International, Inc., to provide its FaceTrac facial recognition 
system to the Tampa Police Department and other federal, state and 
local law enforcement agencies.

"Not everyone comes to sporting events with good intentions," says 
David Watkins, G-TEC's Managing Director, "The multiple distractions 
at the nation's premier athletic events provide criminals with 
opportunities to engage in a variety of illegal activities. G-TEC's 
facial recognition system provided the Raymond James Stadium with a 
superior surveillance system that not only captures images of 
individuals but also compares their facial features against a 
database of known felons."

The FaceTrac core facial recognition technology provides the ability 
to locate faces, to build 'face print' templates and to recognize 
matches to images stored in a database. When integrated with G-TEC's 
law enforcement database, FaceTrac allows rapid search, comparison 
and identification of suspect facial photos within the database. 
FaceTrac may be used for surveillance with multiple locations 
networked to a high capacity site, for analysis and system-search 
results. G-TEC installed FaceTrac at the Raymond James Stadium as a 
single site system, integrated with a custom designed database and 
search result notifications for tracking faces in a crowd and 
monitoring access to secure areas.

Tom Colatosti, Viisage President and CEO said, "Places where large 
crowds are present, such as sporting events, are tempting targets for 
all types mischief, criminal behavior and larger threats. Using 
patented Viisage technology, G-TEC has introduced a new generation of 
tools for law enforcement officials to more effectively and 
non-intrusively provide for public safety. As an integral partner in 
the project, Viisage Technology provided G-TEC with the industry's 
leading and most robust face-recognition technology."

Viisage Technology's FaceFINDER software drives the FaceTrac 
surveillance and identification process. Viisage's industry-leading 
face-recognition technology has the world's largest image database 
deployment in surveillance and investigative applications. Viisage 
also provided the project with image acquisition and integration 
technology and services.

During the week of January 21st, G-TEC deployed the FaceTrac system 
throughout the Raymond James Stadium to detect and identify 
individuals who are wanted or suspect, and may present a danger to 
the public. Using standard cameras to recognize human faces during 
entry to the sporting event, FaceTrac continuously compared faces in 
the incoming crowd to an extensive, customized database of known 
felons, terrorists, and con artists provided by multiple local, state 
and federal agencies. A law enforcement task force of local, state 
and federal agency personnel monitored the system. Once individuals 
were matched with photo files in the database, officers of the joint 
task force, circulating throughout the complex, could be dispatched 
immediately to make possible arrests, quickly and discreetly.

In addition to installing cameras supplied by VelTek International at 
the Raymond James Stadium, G-TEC adapted its FaceTrac capability to 
cameras in Ybor City, Florida to oversee the celebrations before and 
after the athletic events. Raytheon Company, a global developer and 
supplier of high-tech products and services, and a G-TEC partner, 
provided sophisticated cameras and expertise to provide police with 
exceptional night vision capabilities for poorly lit or darkened 
areas in Ybor City.

G-TEC, headquartered in Newtown, PA, develops, manufactures, and 
markets secure database and secure communications systems worldwide. 
G-TEC combines information sharing, biometric authentication, secure 
access, and secure data facility technologies to provide technical 
infrastructure and applications in support of public and private law 
enforcement, corporate security, manufacturing, and secure 
web-enabled virtual communities. G-TEC's Intrapol Analysis Center 
offers secure-access data storage, sharing, and secure virtual 
community systems to corporate and law enforcement entities at the 
local, regional, state, national, and international levels. Graphco 
Technologies is located on the World Wide Web at www.graphcotech.com.

Viisage Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ: VISG), Littleton, Massachusetts, is 
a world leader in biometric face-recognition technology and in 
digital identification solutions. Viisage's face-recognition 
technology is widely recognized as the most convenient, non-intrusive 
and cost-effective biometric available. Viisage's patented 
face-recognition technology, originally developed at MIT, and its 
systems integration and software design capabilities, improve 
personal convenience, privacy and security while deterring identity 
theft and fraud.

Raytheon Company (NYSE: RTNA, RTNB), based in Lexington, Mass., is a 
global technology leader that provides products and services in the 
areas of commercial and defense electronics, business and special 
mission aircraft. The company is now successfully expanding its 
defense technologies into non-defense sectors such as air traffic 
control, data, image and information management, transportation and 
communications. Raytheon's Linthicum, Maryland office has expertise 
in network security and large system development and deployment for 
both national intelligence and commercial customers, and is the 
primary Raytheon branch that supported G-TEC's surveillance efforts 
at the Raymond James Stadium. Additional information is available at 
www.raytheon.com

Veltek International, Inc. is a leading manufacturer of Closed 
Circuit Television and security related equipment. Veltek currently 
offers over 250 different CCTV products through worldwide 
distribution including standard and specialty video cameras, 
housings, video signal, remote transmission, digital video streaming 
and digital storage equipment.

FaceTrac is a trademark of Graphco Technologies, Inc. FaceFINDER is a 
trade mark of Viisage, Inc,


Corporate Information | Face Recognition | Systems Integration | 
Contact us | Home 1999-2000 Viisage Inc. all rights reserved.


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