'Legal Protection' From Eagle Eye Contract Vault Examined

By Brian Karas, Published Nov 02, 2016, 10:31am EDT (Info+)

"I was promised the high-end model for the entry level price."

"Nobody said there would be a monthly service fee when I signed up."

Accurately capturing all of the dialog surrounding a contract, and promises made by a sales person for special concessions, can be challenging. Statements can be misinterpreted, or possibly twisted after the agreement is signed and the conversation is forgotten.

Eagle Eye is adapting their VSaaS offering to include a "Contract Vault", a service that captures the audio and video surrounding a contract negotiation, or an interview process, and storing that in their cloud for archival, or later review.

We spoke with executives from Eagle Eye about this offering and have details in this report.

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Comments (18)

Undisclosed Integrator #1

11/02/16 04:18pm

It seems like a long way around just using a video camera and a new storage device each time (SD card, etc.). You could always implement local backup or cloud storage at that point. I'm all for using industry technology when needed, but a low-tech solution seems like it would actually work as good or better.

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Brian Karas

IPVM | In reply to Undisclosed Integrator #1 | 11/02/16 04:31pm

I think it depends on how you want to use the recordings. For example, if you are recording for regulatory reasons, but rarely, if ever, expect to actually have to pull up the recordings, the SD-card option might work well enough.

If you expect to have to access some of the recordings on a regular basis, then the SD cards would likely become too cumbersome to manage.

This is also easier for users who are less technical: fill out a form, click "Start", the data is automatically recorded, cataloged, moved offsite, etc.

I am not saying this is a perfect solution, or even that it is cost effective, but I can see where some customers would find it preferable over alternatives, particularly if they are not budget constrained.

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Brian Karas

IPVM | 11/02/16 05:31pm

Also, replicating this could be a good entry for someone who wants to enter the Milestone $50,000 Developer Contest.

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Undisclosed #2

IPVMU Certified | In reply to Brian Karas | 11/02/16 07:58pm

All submitted code and examples, to include but not limited to, prototypes, designs, drawings, algorithms, specifications and/or software programs, must be legal and not infringe the IP of any other entity.

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John Honovich

IPVM | In reply to Undisclosed #2 | 11/02/16 08:54pm

Eagle Eye does not own the concept of tagging / managing contract data. Surely someone can take the general idea here and do their own app.

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Undisclosed #2

IPVMU Certified | In reply to John Honovich | 11/02/16 10:01pm

Surely someone can take the general idea here and do their own app.

Sure the general idea of tagging.

But, the word used was 'replicate'.

Don't you think that it might be seen as infringing to create a "Contract Locker" app, with the similar aims of recording and specific transaction types for the express purpose of legal verification of contracts?

I can't say, that why I just threw out the t&c without comment.

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John Honovich

IPVM | In reply to Undisclosed #2 | 11/02/16 10:50pm

Don't you think that it might be seen as infringing to create a "Contract Locker" app, with the similar aims of recording and specific transaction types for the express purpose of legal verification of contracts?

No. I would think it was infringing if they copied specific elements of Eagle Eye's UI or specific workflow patterns.

But if someone looks at Eagle Eye's brochure only and said ok how do I do something like that in Milestone, not sure what grounds Eagle Eye would have.

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Hans Kahler

Eagle Eye Networks
11/03/16 12:55am

Full disclosure - I work for Eagle Eye

We realize that this product is not the right fit for every customer. It is only going to appeal to specific customers, with specific needs. We firmly believe that no single product is a solution for all customers.

For globally distributed customers that need to have centralized, secure access to their recordings and know for sure that they are going to be there when they need them, then our solution might be a good fit.

I agree that the cost is not trivial, and there may be less expensive solutions. However, the infrastructure required to deliver geographic redundancy, instant access, and reliable long term video storage, while securing the video and managing the bandwidth utilization all wrapped up in a simplified single screen which allows the user to focus on their job, and not be a video expert, is worth the price to some customers.

Fortunately for us, we were able to leverage our existing cloud platform for the majority of those features, and we found a few customers that value this service.

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Undisclosed #2

IPVMU Certified | In reply to Hans Kahler | 11/03/16 02:54pm

Fortunately for us, we were able to leverage our existing cloud platform for the majority of those features, and we found a few customers that value this service.

Hans, am I understanding the pricing correctly?

Let's say you are company closing ten large deals a month, say real-estate. You setup your "dealroom" with the equipment necessary, a good camera and a good mic. The deal videos are about 5 min in length and you need access for 5 years to the deals.

Is it true that it would cost me ~$500 a month for 50 minutes of video?

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Hans Kahler

Eagle Eye Networks
In reply to Undisclosed #2 | 11/04/16 02:14am

Your calculation is correct, and if there were only 50 minutes of video generated per month, Contract Vault would probably not be the best fit for that customer. Just like buying a dump truck is not a great idea for someone that only needs to landscape their yard.

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Undisclosed #2

IPVMU Certified | In reply to Hans Kahler | 11/04/16 02:17am

Thanks, Hans.

What if I only paid for one month and then discontinued? Would I still have access to those 50 minutes of video for the five years?

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Hans Kahler

Eagle Eye Networks
In reply to Undisclosed #2 | 11/04/16 03:40am

This product has contract terms that are generally as long or longer than the retention. So, if you wanted to store 5 years of video then you would have a contract term that is at least 5 years. Our contracts typically have a clause that if the contract is not renewed the customers can get an export of their video.

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Skip Cusack

11/03/16 01:45pm

What is the tangible benefit of this application? If you've got a signed agreement between two parties, that's binding and trumps a recording that can at best establish intent or verbal agreement. Is the video record admissible? Is the video watermarked or somehow hardened over conventional surveillance video? I'd like to hear about a real-world case study where this application saved the day, or at least paid for itself.

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Brian Karas

IPVM | 11/04/16 01:48pm

I spoke with IPVideo about their AV fusion product that I referenced in the article.

They say they do something similar, but in more of an on-site/local hardware approach, and often with a minimum of 2 cameras per room. Their solution varies in price, but is around $5,000 per room for all the hardware (cameras, mic, server), plus an annual maintenance/support fee that would run about 10%.

According to IPVideo, one drawback to cloud-based recording is chain of custody issues for police use. Keeping the video on-site/local, and then exported to other media, helps ensure that there can not be claims of evidence tampering, or of evidence being accidentally hacked/exposed by outside attackers.

We can do a more thorough review of the IPVideo product is there is interest.

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Carter Maslan

Camio | In reply to Brian Karas | 11/09/16 04:28pm

FD I'm CEO of Camio. Cloud recording can provide a stronger chain of custody than local recordings because:

  1. recordings can be corroborated by independently controlled timestamps;
  2. tamper-proof access to encrypted recordings can be inaccessible to person recording;
  3. server logs can provide full audit.

Camio has Delegated Recording for contract signings / tax preparation in distributed offices. Tax preparation and accounting companies use their phone/tablet/computer for ad hoc recording without any usernames or passwords.

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Brian Karas

IPVM | In reply to Carter Maslan | 11/09/16 06:46pm

Carter, thanks for your comment.

Regarding chain of custody issues, I can see your argument for cloud recording. Have you had any of your video data used in court? (I would guess not yet as your offering is relatively new?)

I have only been involved in one video evidence case where I was personally subpoenaed to provide additional detail/verification about video I pulled for a case. My experience was that chain of custody verifications were very much up to the will of the specific court and there were no hard and fast rules. Obviously products that did more to watermark video or manage the integrity of the video left less things to dispute, but these things were not outright requirements either.

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Carter Maslan

Camio | In reply to Brian Karas | 11/10/16 12:52am

Brian - in a robbery and car-jacking, police detectives confirmed the admissibility of Camio's tamper-proof storage after interviewing us for an hour. I don't know whether the video was used in court, but I know that it was approved to be used in prosecuting the crime.

This was for a robbery and car-jacking in which 7 Camio customers captured video and submitted it to police via hyperlinks.

When we described that video is written only once upon receipt, includes timestamps of its time of creation and its receipt by servers, and that all subsequent operations like sharing/viewing/labeling do not touch the original encrypted video, they confirmed that it was admissible without telling us the exact criteria for admissibility.

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John Honovich

IPVM | 01/01/18 12:21am

New blog post from the Eagle Eye sales director of this product talking about how they are targeting the 'vacation club' market with this.

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