Intelligent CIO Africa Issue 74 | Page 42

Afriland First Bank Camero surveillance solution at all b Genetec ’ s Security Centre Om

COUNTRY FOCUS : CAMEROON
Cameroon-headquartered commercial bank Afriland First Bank , recently achieved real-time visibility of all its 40 branch sites after it implemented an IP video surveillance solution from Genetec to enhance security and customer service . Jean-Paul Yamcheu , Director , Information Systems , Afriland First Bank Cameroon , explains to Intelligent CIO Africa what motivated the bank to implement this project .
Aerial cityscape of Yaounde , the capital of Cameroon

One way for a bank to ensure its success is to provide good security . Customers want to know their money is in safe hands and employees want to feel protected . That ’ s why Afriland First Bank , the first bank network in Cameroon , monitors its 40 branches from its headquarters in Yaoundé . Having real-time visibility of all locations means its team can quickly handle any situation and keep its employees , customers and their money safe .

The challenges
In Cameroon , video cannot be accessed at distant sites due to network bandwidth limitations . This means that real-time monitoring is not always possible .
Jean-Paul Yamcheu , Director , Information Systems , Afriland First Bank Cameroon , said : “ When we started our first video surveillance project , we struggled with insufficient bandwidth . We have 350 cameras across the country and the video loads were quite heavy . We were forced to store the images locally and then export them to storage during off-peak hours . This limited the effectiveness of our security personnel at the Yaoundé headquarters , who were only alerted to incidents after they happened .”
Incidents at the branches are not limited to physical security cases . The most recurring problem stems from clients who dispute the legitimacy of transactions . Having immediate access to the video evidence is essential to solving these cases and disproving any false claims .
“ Without a live view on our national operations , the bank was heavily investing in local security guards to monitor each site . When an incident occurred , they
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