Build 2022: Azure Video Indexer Enhancements

Build 2022: Azure Video Indexer Enhancements

by | May 27, 2022 | Technology

This article is contributed. See the original author and article here.

At MS Build 2022, Azure Video Indexer service is becoming the primary video analytics offering Applied AI services, a GA service for analyzing stored videos (e.g. media libraries), with a single endpoint,  more than 35 video and audio AIs – mainly based on Azure Cognitive Services. 


 


“Hi, My name is Azure Video Indexer”


 


Azure Video Indexer (VI), formerly known as Azure Video Analyzer for Media, was recently renamed back to VI, avoiding confusion for our media customers.  VI is officially the primary applied AI service for videos. See Applied AI Azure page (in the bottom)._ VI has a new product page in ACOM and a new pricing page in ACOM; You can explore the available regions in regions availability Azure page and to learn about VI APIs in Azure Video Indexer developer portal.  Our web experience has a fresh landing page, and the product documentation was also up to date with recent changes. In Azure portal, the resource provider name from now on is “Video Indexer.” As of May 1st, our new updated repository of Azure Video Indexer widget was renamed. Use https://www.npmjs.com/package/@azure/video-indexer-widgets instead.


Oh, and we are here to stay with this name. 


 


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Figure #1, Azure Video Indexer Web experience 


 


Our focus recently as a GA service, was supportability and quality of service. 


 


We are thrilled to announce the following enhancements: 


 


Better quality of AIs 


 


Line breaking in transcripts improvements 


Improved line break logic to better split transcript into sentences. New editing capabilities are now available through the Azure Video Indexer portal, such as adding a new line and editing the line’s timestamp. For more information, see Insert or remove transcript lines. We have invested in quality improvements of our audio pipeline so we expect much better results starting May 1st. 


 


Video Insights improvements


Object Character Reader (OCR) quality is improved by 60%. Face Detection quality is improved by 20%. Label accuracy is improved by 30% over a wide variety of videos. These improvements are available immediately in all regions and do not require any changes by the customer.


 


Closed Captioning files now support including speakers’ attributes


Azure Video Indexer enables you to include speakers’ characteristic based on a closed captioning file that you choose to download. To include the speakers’ attributes, select Downloads -> Closed Captions -> choose the closed captioning downloadable file format (SRT, VTT, TTML, TXT, or CSV) and check Include speakers checkbox.


 


Better Security and Supportability 


 


Service tag


Azure Video Indexer is now part of Network Service Tags. Video Indexer often needs to access other Azure resources (for example, Storage). If you secure your inbound traffic to your resources with a Network Security Group you can now select Video Indexer as part of the built-in Service Tags. This will simplify security management as we populate the Service Tag with our public IPs.


 


Azure Monitor integration


Azure Video Indexer now supports Diagnostics settings for Audit events. Logs of Audit events can now be exported through diagnostics settings to Azure Log Analytics, Storage, Event Hubs, or a third-party solution.


The additions enable easier access to analyze the data, monitor resource operation, and create automatically flows to act on an event. For more information, see Monitor Azure Video Indexer.


 


Celebrity recognition feature toggle


You can now enable or disable the celebrity recognition model on the account level (on classic account only). To turn on or off the model, go to the account settings > and toggle on/off the model. Once you disable the model, Video Indexer insights will not include the output of celebrity model and will not run the celebrity model pipeline in your account. 


 


You can explore the list of our recent features for NAB, 2022 in this blog post. 


 


New: Call to join our limited program: Run video and audio AIs in the browser 


 


At //Build 2022, in the 2nd day, Microsoft CTO Kevin Scott, shared how new advances in AI and other tech and software innovations are empowering developers and creators to do more, be more productive and creative, and enrich the lives of everyone on the planet in the The Future of AI Development Tools. 


 


Imagine how the experience would look like if any social network company who gives a channel for content creators to upload a video or audio files or to allow live video or audio streaming, would also allow a secure way to enrich and improve the content in the browser, before everybody is able to see it. Social networks would easily be able to e.g. moderate the content, suggest hashtags for the video content and allow dubbing for the content which is created making it more trusted and accessible. 


 


So, how can we ease the pain for a web developers, without asking them to explore multiple open sources, in a secured manner powered by Azure? 


Today we are announcing an exciting new limited-access program (private preview) we have incubated, which will be released first for internal use extending to all Microsoft owned companies. It’s temporary name is “On device AI” (ODAI) – innovative technology in the domain for content creation and social networks, that runs artificial intelligence in the browser in a low-code-low-cost manner


 


With ODAI extension, web developers working for social networks such as LinkedIn, can use Azure packaging service to generate a customized-encrypted package, with vision and/or speech AI pipeline of choice, in a secured manner, optimized for the social network business needs. The deployable package content runs seamlessly in the browser using generic existing web standards spanning from laptops to smartphones and tables, and allows to benefit from the client hardware to significantly reduce the provider costs, in this case the social network.


 


As mentioned, it’s a private preview program. If you wanna learn more, contact visupport@microsoft.com


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Figure #2, auto generate tags extracted from topics in the video, using in browser AI new technology for content creators and social networks 


 


Join Azure Video Indexer Today! Explore, Learn, Share


 


For those of you who are new to our technology, we encourage you to get started today with these helpful resources:



 

Zero to Hero: Your Guide to Getting Skilled on Azure Data and AI

Zero to Hero: Your Guide to Getting Skilled on Azure Data and AI

by | May 26, 2022 | Technology

This article is contributed. See the original author and article here.

Photo Blog 2.jpgWe are excited to highlight the Zero to Hero guide, our very own journey to help developers and engineers get started on Azure. We have a large collection of resources to help you ramp up in the cloud, and these guides curate all our best-in-class content in one place, making it easier to find and navigate. Technology is changing fast. With these guides you will ramp-up and level up your skill set to keep the upper hand in this competitive market. Our Zero to Hero guides ensure that you have a solid foundation as you begin to explore Azure.


 


The Zero to Hero guide will show you how to achieve expertise and prepare for certification in the following areas: data engineering, data science, and artificial intelligence. Within 4 weeks, regardless of where you are in your journey, we can propel you to the next level.


 


Each week you’ll watch videos, learn from step-by-step training, and try skills for yourself with self-guided exercises. Don’t forget to also sign up for the associated 30 days learning challenges to earn 50 percent off Microsoft certification. 


 


Download the guides below and start learning today!


 



  1. Zero to Hero with Azure Data Engineering

  2. Zero to Hero with Azure Machine Learning

  3. Zero to Hero with Azure Artificial Intelligence


 


Are you a developer who builds apps with low-code techniques? Are you a solution architect defining the design and implementation of technology solutions in Azure? We have guides for you too!


 


Azure Skills Navigator for System Administrators and Solution Architects


 


Azure Skills Navigator for Developers 


 

Drupal Releases Security Updates

by | May 26, 2022 | Security, Technology

This article is contributed. See the original author and article here.

Drupal has released security updates to address a vulnerability that does not affect Drupal core but may affect some contributed projects or custom code on Drupal sites. Exploitation of this vulnerability could allow a remote attacker to take control of an affected website.

CISA encourages users and administrators to review Drupal security advisory SA-CORE-010 and apply the necessary updates.

CISA and DoD Release 5G Security Evaluation Process Investigation Study

by | May 26, 2022 | Security, Technology

This article is contributed. See the original author and article here.

CISA and the Department of Defense (DoD) have released their 5G Security Evaluation Process Investigation Study for federal agencies. The new features, capabilities, and services offered by fifth-generation (5G) cellular network technology can transform mission and business operations; and federal agencies will eventually be applying different 5G usage scenarios: low-, mid-, and high-band spectrum. 

The study provides an overview of the proposed 5G Security Evaluation Process and applies the process to a private 5G network use case to demonstrate considerations for each step within the overarching process. The study is a joint effort among CISA, the Department of Homeland Security’s Science and Technology Directorate, and DoD’s Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering.

The proposed process detailed in the study can support government agency activities during the Risk Management Framework system-level “Prepare” step for 5G-enabled systems; and federal program and project managers should use the study’s repeatable methodology in their required evaluations. CISA encourages federal program and project managers involved in 5G implementation to review the blog post by CISA Executive Assistant Director Eric Goldstein, CISA, DHS S&T, DOD Introduce Results of an Assessment into the 5G Security Evaluation Process, which links to the study.