Austin, Texas-based CoVi Technologies' recently unveiled high-definition vehicle surveillance security system provides law enforcement officers with a powerful new tool designed to monitor and identify vehicles involved in suspicious or criminal activity, while improving vehicle security in a variety of environments.

According to statistics compiled in 2005 by the Federal Bureau of Investigations, a motor vehicle is stolen in the U.S. every 26 seconds at a cost of more than $7 billion per year.

The U.S. Customs and Border Protection reported in 2007 that homeland security and organized crime activities have intensified the need to monitor the more than 335,000 vehicles crossing U.S. borders each day. The report further states there is an urgent need to monitor drivers with potentially malicious intent entering potentially vulnerable private and public sites, including government buildings, power plants and universities.

"Vehicle theft is not only a crime affecting individuals and businesses, it has worldwide consequences," says Barry Walker, CoVi's president and CEO. "An extreme example of the global ripple effects of this problem is a citing in a recent FBI counter terrorism report that vehicles used in deadly Iraq car bombings were likely stolen from the United States. Increasing vehicle surveillance challenges are requiring an entirely new level of technology flexibility, power and sophistication."

Key components of the CoVi vehicle surveillance system include, 1,280 x 720 resolution HD video cameras with a 16:9 aspect ratio that provides superior image clarity, robust plate finding and OCR algorithms, and advanced "search and watch" applications. The system also features digital video zoom-in capabilities and easily scales from one sensor/camera to an unlimited number of sensors/cameras.