March 22, 2025 • 10 mins
From professional stadiums to college arenas, ensuring player and fan safety has never been more critical. With growing security challenges at sporting events, teams and venues are turning to AI-powered security and real-time threat detection to prevent incidents before they happen. OWilliam DeWitt of Verkada discuses how artificial intelligence and advanced security solutions are being used to monitor high-risk areas, enhance emergency response and keep players, staff, and spectators safe. Your viewers will find it fascinating to learn how NEW smart security systems are designed to provide real-time threat detection and emergency response for NFL teams and other venues. WHAT YOU’LL LEARN ABOUT SPORTS SAFETY WILL INCLUDE: SECURITY — How teams and venues use AI for real-time securityPROTECTION — Advanced tools that help prevent security breaches and ensure game-day safety for players and fansRESPONSE — AI-powered analytics assisting in rapid threat detection and resolutionACTION — Amazing examples where AI security and Verkada ving safety SPOKESPERSON BACKGROUND: William DeWitt – Director of Global Security, Verkada
William DeWitt is the Director of Global Security at Verkada, where he is building a best-in-class corporate security program. Prior to Verkada, Will spent nearly 12 years at Palantir, where he served as Global Safety and Security Lead, building the company’s corporate global security and government security programs. Under his leadership, Palantir’s government security program obtained accreditation at the highest level, allowing it to process U.S. government data and pursue government contracts. The Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency awarded the program he built the Cogswell Award. Previously, Will served in the US Marine Corps for eight years. William visis with Mark Alyn.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/late-night-health-radio--2804369/support.
William DeWitt is the Director of Global Security at Verkada, where he is building a best-in-class corporate security program. Prior to Verkada, Will spent nearly 12 years at Palantir, where he served as Global Safety and Security Lead, building the company’s corporate global security and government security programs. Under his leadership, Palantir’s government security program obtained accreditation at the highest level, allowing it to process U.S. government data and pursue government contracts. The Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency awarded the program he built the Cogswell Award. Previously, Will served in the US Marine Corps for eight years. William visis with Mark Alyn.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/late-night-health-radio--2804369/support.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
This is a special edition of Late Night Health. I'm
Mark Dollan. We've been talking a lot about AI, artificial intelligence,
and we have a new application for it, and that's
providing safety for sporting events for both the fans and
the players. Our guest is William will DeWitt, his director
(00:32):
of global security for ver Keda and has spent the
time as a US Marine and as I said, is
now the director of global security for Burkeda. Well, welcome
to Late Night Health. I'm really curious, Ken, do we
(00:54):
need AI to help with this kind of security to
protect both the fans and the players.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Yeah, Mark, thanks for having me on today. We absolutely
need help protecting the fans and players. I think no
one would disagree that we need help. If you look
at the news headlines of what's happened at some of
these events recently over the last few years, you know,
AI is you know, it's not just a buzzword. It
(01:25):
is actually help helping keep people safe by shortening the
response time to these events. You know a lot of
these events only last a couple of minutes, uh, and
we need people to be able to respond as fast
as possible. And that's where AI comes in.
Speaker 1 (01:44):
AI can obviously calculate faster than a human being, but
can it in a in a in an arena determined
if there's a situation, sure the it it still.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
Requires a human interaction. A lot of the times, you know,
there is like AIS weapons detection and things like that
out there. You know what it's doing is it's giving
you like just kind of like another thousand pair of eyes.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Right.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
It's that you know, you don't just have the security
professionals kind of scanning the audience looking for bad actors
or looking for someone is you're actually using the computing
power to basically be a force multiplier for these individuals.
So you know, it's like say someone reports, you know,
kind of an over zealous fan or a bad actor
(02:37):
or someone in a stadium. The way that the system
you know, really enhances the the situation is that you know,
instead of kind of putting out a bolow, you know,
they call out on the radio and they say, hey,
you know, be on the lookout for a guy in
a green shirt and blue jeans. You know, we're looking
for him if anyone sees them. You know, let us
know is that you can go to the system and
(03:00):
we have a search bar, you know, very similar to
like an Internet search, and you could simply just type
in mail green shirt, blue jeans, and it's going to
return to you all the males and green shirts and
blue jeans, and you know you're gonna have their pictures
right there and you can rapidly find your you know,
person that you're looking for and then you know, send
your security professionals out there to like intercept them. And this,
(03:23):
you know, it does it almost immediately, so it's like
your response time goes into seconds rather than minutes.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
What sports are using this system right now? I mean
I'm you know, we're we're almost in spring training or
are we in spring training for baseball? Uh? You know, basketball? Football?
What major league sports are using AI to help protect
(03:55):
the fans as well as the players.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
Yeah. So you know, we have a great partner ship
that we're working with like the l A Rams uh
and we're working with the NFL on you know, we
have NBA teams uh and organizations that are they're using
our equipment, you know, and it's you know, we're we're
growing in this this segment, uh as as more and
more use cases kind of come up. You know, they're
(04:20):
using us in different ways. You know, there's I can
tell you that the NBA is using us to help
combat like, uh, vaping and smoking of like marijuana inside
you know, these closed arenas where they play play basketball.
So the way they're doing that is we make a
line of air quality controllers in addition to cameras and
(04:42):
and whatnot, and the because our products are like fully
integrated and we're using AI. What it does is it
will automatically sense, you know, someone vaping or smoking, whether
it's cigarettes or marijuana, and it can tell the difference
between all three. And when it does that, it will
also alert camera that's closest to like kind of get
a picture of that person, and then the system will
(05:06):
generate an alert with a picture of that person and
send it to the closest security professional to that location,
uh and allow them to go and kind of stop
that behavior to help that, you know, with the health
and safety of everyone else in the arena.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
It would seem to me that you could also use
this for concerts, rock concerts in particular with the you know,
with pot and marijuana for sure.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
I mean, the the equipment is in you know, these
venues for the you know where they they do the
sports where they're often you know, used double time for
these these concert venues as well. So absolutely it's being
used in those scenarios too.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
So were you we're looking at at at at pot
What about other instances uh uh that may be more serious, uh,
to surrounding fans as well as some of the players.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Yeah, I think you know, some of the other things
you know where we use is you know a lot
of times you have kind of those over zealous fans
that aren't allowed in the arena anymore, or maybe the
players have a lot of you know, kind of stalkers
or people that really like to get close to them,
you know. So it's like you can use kind of
facial detection technology within the AI in order to set
(06:20):
up alerts when those people arrive on site and you
can kind of stop them at the perimeter before they
ever even make it into the stadium to kind of
cause any issues.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
A lot of people are afraid of AI. They're afraid
that AI is going to one take jobs and two
maybe even take over the world. And at this point,
maybe that's not such a bad idea, But should people
be afraid of AI, especially when it can help in
(06:51):
this case save lines.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Yeah, I don't. I don't think so. I think it's
like something that we need to embrace. I don't see
AI as take making jobs. I see AI is being
a tool that people can use in order to make
themselves more proficient, work faster. You know, I don't. I
don't know the AI is ever going to be able
to completely take any any jobs. The way that I
(07:15):
think about it is AI when I'm using it for
you know, whatever reason I'm using it, if I'm in
the system, almost gives me superpowers. Right, I can do
things that used to take hours in you know, minutes
or seconds now. But I'm still doing the things. I'm
just doing them much faster, much more efficient.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
And so AI can and will, in your opinion, produce
more jobs because we still need people who want develop
the AI and then of course use it like in
a stadium or in a concert or wherever else AI
is being used by Verdon Ver.
Speaker 2 (07:56):
Varcated, Yeah, for sure, absolutely, I think it is. It's
not taking anyone's job. I think it's only enhancing people's productivity.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
As we wrap up our time together, how does AI
work to detect the security issues? And what issues are there?
You've already mentioned one in determining smokers.
Speaker 2 (08:23):
Yeah, it's uh, the you know, it's like as I said,
you know, there's kind of the looking for the bad people,
looking you know, to keep them out. You know, maybe
we're not looking for a bad person. Another use case is,
you know a lot of times in these venues, you know,
we have children that go missing. You know, they go
to the restroom, they don't come back on time, their
(08:44):
parents get worried, you know, they go to get a
snack or whatnot. It's it's kind of the same use case,
but just a different scenario where you know, you can
go to this system. You can kind of type in
the description of the child that's missing and use this
system to kind of locate that child within seconds, you know,
whereas before, you know, you kind of have to go
(09:06):
to that control room and do a video review, which
could take hours, you know, and that's why you always
get the pictures or you know they were last seeing here,
you know, four hours ago, they were last sing here
three hours ago. Now we're able to do that within seconds,
so we can get to these locations much faster and
you know, find that missing individual and and help them.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
And the parents of course would would be relieved much
much faster. Well, thank you for your time today, I
appreciate it. Where can we go for more information that
people would like to learn more about Kata?
Speaker 2 (09:41):
Yeah, so you can go to our website. It's www
dot Vercotta dot com and that is v E r
k A d A.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
B E r ka d a dot com.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
That's it, Mark, that's it.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
Hey, Well, thanks a lot for being here. I'm Mark
Allen and this his late night help.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
H
This is a special edition of Late Night Health. I'm
Mark Dollan. We've been talking a lot about AI, artificial intelligence,
and we have a new application for it, and that's
providing safety for sporting events for both the fans and
the players. Our guest is William will DeWitt, his director
(00:32):
of global security for ver Keda and has spent the
time as a US Marine and as I said, is
now the director of global security for Burkeda. Well, welcome
to Late Night Health. I'm really curious, Ken, do we
(00:54):
need AI to help with this kind of security to
protect both the fans and the players.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Yeah, Mark, thanks for having me on today. We absolutely
need help protecting the fans and players. I think no
one would disagree that we need help. If you look
at the news headlines of what's happened at some of
these events recently over the last few years, you know,
AI is you know, it's not just a buzzword. It
(01:25):
is actually help helping keep people safe by shortening the
response time to these events. You know a lot of
these events only last a couple of minutes, uh, and
we need people to be able to respond as fast
as possible. And that's where AI comes in.
Speaker 1 (01:44):
AI can obviously calculate faster than a human being, but
can it in a in a in an arena determined
if there's a situation, sure the it it still.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
Requires a human interaction. A lot of the times, you know,
there is like AIS weapons detection and things like that
out there. You know what it's doing is it's giving
you like just kind of like another thousand pair of eyes.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Right.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
It's that you know, you don't just have the security
professionals kind of scanning the audience looking for bad actors
or looking for someone is you're actually using the computing
power to basically be a force multiplier for these individuals.
So you know, it's like say someone reports, you know,
kind of an over zealous fan or a bad actor
(02:37):
or someone in a stadium. The way that the system
you know, really enhances the the situation is that you know,
instead of kind of putting out a bolow, you know,
they call out on the radio and they say, hey,
you know, be on the lookout for a guy in
a green shirt and blue jeans. You know, we're looking
for him if anyone sees them. You know, let us
know is that you can go to the system and
(03:00):
we have a search bar, you know, very similar to
like an Internet search, and you could simply just type
in mail green shirt, blue jeans, and it's going to
return to you all the males and green shirts and
blue jeans, and you know you're gonna have their pictures
right there and you can rapidly find your you know,
person that you're looking for and then you know, send
your security professionals out there to like intercept them. And this,
(03:23):
you know, it does it almost immediately, so it's like
your response time goes into seconds rather than minutes.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
What sports are using this system right now? I mean
I'm you know, we're we're almost in spring training or
are we in spring training for baseball? Uh? You know, basketball? Football?
What major league sports are using AI to help protect
(03:55):
the fans as well as the players.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
Yeah. So you know, we have a great partner ship
that we're working with like the l A Rams uh
and we're working with the NFL on you know, we
have NBA teams uh and organizations that are they're using
our equipment, you know, and it's you know, we're we're
growing in this this segment, uh as as more and
more use cases kind of come up. You know, they're
(04:20):
using us in different ways. You know, there's I can
tell you that the NBA is using us to help
combat like, uh, vaping and smoking of like marijuana inside
you know, these closed arenas where they play play basketball.
So the way they're doing that is we make a
line of air quality controllers in addition to cameras and
(04:42):
and whatnot, and the because our products are like fully
integrated and we're using AI. What it does is it
will automatically sense, you know, someone vaping or smoking, whether
it's cigarettes or marijuana, and it can tell the difference
between all three. And when it does that, it will
also alert camera that's closest to like kind of get
a picture of that person, and then the system will
(05:06):
generate an alert with a picture of that person and
send it to the closest security professional to that location,
uh and allow them to go and kind of stop
that behavior to help that, you know, with the health
and safety of everyone else in the arena.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
It would seem to me that you could also use
this for concerts, rock concerts in particular with the you know,
with pot and marijuana for sure.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
I mean, the the equipment is in you know, these
venues for the you know where they they do the
sports where they're often you know, used double time for
these these concert venues as well. So absolutely it's being
used in those scenarios too.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
So were you we're looking at at at at pot
What about other instances uh uh that may be more serious, uh,
to surrounding fans as well as some of the players.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Yeah, I think you know, some of the other things
you know where we use is you know a lot
of times you have kind of those over zealous fans
that aren't allowed in the arena anymore, or maybe the
players have a lot of you know, kind of stalkers
or people that really like to get close to them,
you know. So it's like you can use kind of
facial detection technology within the AI in order to set
(06:20):
up alerts when those people arrive on site and you
can kind of stop them at the perimeter before they
ever even make it into the stadium to kind of
cause any issues.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
A lot of people are afraid of AI. They're afraid
that AI is going to one take jobs and two
maybe even take over the world. And at this point,
maybe that's not such a bad idea, But should people
be afraid of AI, especially when it can help in
(06:51):
this case save lines.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Yeah, I don't. I don't think so. I think it's
like something that we need to embrace. I don't see
AI as take making jobs. I see AI is being
a tool that people can use in order to make
themselves more proficient, work faster. You know, I don't. I
don't know the AI is ever going to be able
to completely take any any jobs. The way that I
(07:15):
think about it is AI when I'm using it for
you know, whatever reason I'm using it, if I'm in
the system, almost gives me superpowers. Right, I can do
things that used to take hours in you know, minutes
or seconds now. But I'm still doing the things. I'm
just doing them much faster, much more efficient.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
And so AI can and will, in your opinion, produce
more jobs because we still need people who want develop
the AI and then of course use it like in
a stadium or in a concert or wherever else AI
is being used by Verdon Ver.
Speaker 2 (07:56):
Varcated, Yeah, for sure, absolutely, I think it is. It's
not taking anyone's job. I think it's only enhancing people's productivity.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
As we wrap up our time together, how does AI
work to detect the security issues? And what issues are there?
You've already mentioned one in determining smokers.
Speaker 2 (08:23):
Yeah, it's uh, the you know, it's like as I said,
you know, there's kind of the looking for the bad people,
looking you know, to keep them out. You know, maybe
we're not looking for a bad person. Another use case is,
you know a lot of times in these venues, you know,
we have children that go missing. You know, they go
to the restroom, they don't come back on time, their
(08:44):
parents get worried, you know, they go to get a
snack or whatnot. It's it's kind of the same use case,
but just a different scenario where you know, you can
go to this system. You can kind of type in
the description of the child that's missing and use this
system to kind of locate that child within seconds, you know,
whereas before, you know, you kind of have to go
(09:06):
to that control room and do a video review, which
could take hours, you know, and that's why you always
get the pictures or you know they were last seeing here,
you know, four hours ago, they were last sing here
three hours ago. Now we're able to do that within seconds,
so we can get to these locations much faster and
you know, find that missing individual and and help them.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
And the parents of course would would be relieved much
much faster. Well, thank you for your time today, I
appreciate it. Where can we go for more information that
people would like to learn more about Kata?
Speaker 2 (09:41):
Yeah, so you can go to our website. It's www
dot Vercotta dot com and that is v E r
k A d A.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
B E r ka d a dot com.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
That's it, Mark, that's it.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
Hey, Well, thanks a lot for being here. I'm Mark
Allen and this his late night help.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
H
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