The field of electronic surveillance has matured significantly over the past 2 decades, fuelled by the growth of safety and security concerns around the world. Surveillance cameras are being used for a wide variety of applications from national security to securing the home. Video analytics, also called intelligent video surveillance, is a technology that uses software to automatically identify specific objects, behaviours or attitudes in video footage. It transforms the video into data to be transmitted or archived so that the video surveillance system can act accordingly. It may involve activating a mobile camera in order to obtain more specific data about the scene or simply to send a warning to surveillance personnel so that a decision may be made on the proper intervention required. As video analytics has dramatically improved its effectiveness as a tool for providing real-time, actionable intelligence in security installations, it's getting serious attention for other uses as well. Its versatility provides excellent return on investment for a wide range of applications, including business intelligence, factory automation, loss prevention, public liability assessments, training, consumer behavior analysis, monitoring traffic flow, and more.