New Insys option helps OTT operators shield viewers from sensitive content
Insys Video Technologies has added new capabilities to its over-the-top (OTT) video solutions that enable automated identification of celebrities and detection of inappropriate content in catch-up TV programming and on-demand video libraries. Viewers can find clips featuring a particular celebrity and jump to the exact point in the show where that person appears, while nudity and violence can be automatically flagged and blurred.
OTT video services enable media organisations to offer more content to their viewers than ever before. However, the huge volume of available content creates challenges for both audiences and providers. Consumers need efficient ways of discovering shows that interest them, which can be like finding the proverbial needle in a haystack.
Meanwhile, operators must ensure that all content meets their brand’s standards and regulatory restrictions for sensitive material, but the sheer number of clips makes manually reviewing them cost- and time-prohibitive. Recordings of linear channels for catch-up viewing are particularly challenging, as they typically do not include the same level of detailed metadata that accompanies ‘pre-packaged’ on-demand programs.
Leveraging API integration with Amazon Rekognition, a solution from Amazon Web Services (AWS), the new features in Insys’ OTT platform can solve both problems. Content added to the operator’s library is quickly and automatically analysed for recognisable people and sensitive content. Amazon Rekognition is a deep learning-powered video analysis service that can identify objects, people, text, scenes, and activities as well as detect any inappropriate content. The scalable service performs real-time video analysis using machine learning models that are trained to detect thousands of objects and activities accurately, and to extract motion-based context from video.
Insys’ front-end user experiences utilise the results of this analysis to allow viewers to search for shows or news clips that include particular celebrities or politicians. A timeline then allows them to jump directly to the specific moments at which those people are seen, while overlays in the Insys video player show the names of recognized individuals during playback. The Insys player window also displays markers on the program timeline to indicate scenes with nudity or violence, with the operator-controlled option to automatically blur the video during playback to obscure the offending content.