Developing an industry standard for data communications between PIDS equipment and third party systems

In early Perimeter Intrusion Detection Systems (PIDS) dry contacts were the interface of choice, inherently compatible amongst both manufacturers and third party systems. Proprietary sensor field buses have quickly displaced dry contacts for PIDS installations; this has lead to ongoing compatibility issues with third party systems such as Security Management Systems (SMS), Physical Security Information Managers (PSIM), Video management systems and building management systems. Several approaches have been proposed to create a standard interface at the sensor level. However, these approaches compromise the ability to view data on a global level for the purpose of advanced diagnostics and performance improvement. A method for transacting data from the proprietary sensor bus to a third party system via an industry standardized interface would allow manufacturers to focus their development efforts on better sensor products. A gateway application would manage sensor bus transactions, providing a means for enhanced global sensor processing and remote diagnostics while implementing the standardized interface to third party systems.