The Challenge of the Multimedia in the Control Room

While systems have long been established to parse structured data, the need to handle vast amounts of unstructured information is becoming an increasing challenge in today’s control room environment. This is particularly true in emergency control rooms, where we continue to see rapid growth in citizen-generated videos, images, and voice recordings submitted to report crimes, traffic incidents, or ongoing situations.

One example is the UK’s National Dashcam Safety Portal (NDSP), which allows drivers to upload footage from dashcams, mobile phones, and cameras directly to their local police force (with more than 40 forces now participating (Nextbase, 2025)). The benefits of such a service are clear, and it has become an essential tool for reporting dangerous driving and submitting evidence for crashes and incidents.

Making Sense of the Unstructured

The core challenge lies in the fact that both structured and unstructured data are now flooding into the control room, and it’s not just about scale but about managing multiple formats and sources in real-time.

The lines can also blur when we consider how one driver might interpret behavior on the road compared to another. The spectrum of personal perception is wide, which is why systems are increasingly incorporating Artificial Intelligence (AI) and analytics to help interpret unstructured media more consistently.

These systems become even more effective when unstructured data is combined with structured data. Nextbase, the company behind the NDSP, has extended its technology with the Emergency SOS feature. In the case that a serious incident is detected, the dashcam automatically triggers the driver’s mobile phone. If the driver does not respond, the emergency services are alerted automatically. Key structured data such as the car’s location, direction of travel, and time of incident are shared immediately. Additionally, relevant medical information can be passed to the receiving hospital.

In-Transit Control Room Support

The opportunity for partial triage while the patient is en route is invaluable. Hospital teams can prepare in advance, understanding the patient’s blood type, any known allergies, and relevant medical history before arrival.

We can expect further combinations of structured and unstructured data as rapid-response technologies continue to evolve. Today’s systems are being designed to take advantage of low-latency, high-bandwidth connectivity, such as 5G. These capabilities will only accelerate the ability to ingest, analyze, and act on multimedia in real-time.

This presents the opportunity to not only future-proof control room operations, but to allow technology to drive increased sophistication in how those operations function. This becomes even more important as decentralized and hybrid control room models become the norm.

The Role of KVM in a Multimedia-Rich Control Room

The growing volume of multimedia entering the control room may continue to strain systems due to the sheer scale of data and the need for rapid ingestion, analysis, understanding, and action. As such, KVM (Keyboard, Video and Mouse) solutions remain a central pillar of control room design, enabling operators to access critical systems securely, reliably, and with minimal latency – whether they are on-site or part of a distributed model. To find out more about how KVM can facilitate change and help fuse new technologies into your control room, contact us here.