Centralized Smart Card-Based Access Control System

Abstract

A vital requirement for critical units in large institutions and companies such as the Exams and Records department of a University is restricted access. Such institutions usually take measures in the form of physical or knowledge-based tokens to control access to such restricted areas but several of them have failed over time and the fairly reliable ones are expensive to implement. This paper discusses and proposes the design of a centralized smart card-based security and surveillance system for a prototype property with the use of cost effective components and web-based applications. The design consists of three modules, the smart card and reader module, door controller module, the web and database module interfaced with a surveillance system. The surveillance system comprises a camera hoisted at a strategic point of the building. The camera sends monitored activities as video feeds to a server and subsequently saved in the database.