Patent ID: 7751647

Claim:
A method for detecting when a camera providing video surveillance of a scene in successive image frames is an invalid camera, said method comprising the steps of: periodically generating a background image from a plurality of said successive image frames from the camera; extracting first features from the background image; extracting second features from new image frames from said camera; correlating, for each of said new image frames, at common locations in the new image frame and the last periodically generated background image, in which said locations are associated with said first features extracted from the last periodically generated background image and second features of the new image frame, to determine non-correlated features in the new image frame with respect to the last periodically generated background image; and determining said camera as representing an invalid camera in accordance with one or more of the number, percentage, or spatial distribution of said non-correlated features in a plurality of ones of said new images.