A low-cost multi-agent system for physical security in smart buildings

Modern organizations face numerous physical security threats, from fire hazards to more intricate concerns regarding surveillance and unauthorized personnel. Conventional standalone fire and intrusion detection solutions must be installed and maintained independently, which leads to high capital and operational costs. Nonetheless, due to recent developments in smart sensors, computer vision techniques, and wireless communication technologies, these solutions can be integrated in a modular and low-cost manner. This work introduces Integrated Physical Security System (IP2S), a multi-agent system capable of coordinating diverse Internet of Things (IoT) sensors and actuators for an efficient mitigation of multiple physical security events. The proposed system was tested in a live case study that combined fire and intrusion detection in an industrial shop floor environment with four different sectors, two surveillance cameras, and a firefighting robot. The experimental results demonstrate that the integration of several events in a single automated system can be advantageous for the security of smart buildings, reducing false alarms and delays.