MV Cloud Archive

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Overview

Featuring integrated solid-state storage onboard every camera (excluding MV2 which features live video only), the MV product line has revolutionized the typical surveillance architecture by eliminating the need for a network video recorder (NVR) or other storage servers. Using optimized retention tools in the management dashboard, users can make informed decisions about balancing video quality with their organizational retention needs, ensuring they achieve the perfect balance.

Still, there are times when legal requirements or other regional regulations may necessitate longer durations of continuous 24/7 recording or off-site backup. Cloud archiving options for MV cameras fill in these gaps by allowing for 7, 30, 90, 180, or 365 days of continuous backup recording.

Archive Specifications

All MV models are supported.
Video playback and exporting of video from cloud archive.
Required upload bandwidth of >1 Mbps per camera.
Supports only the following Quality and Retention Settings:

Camera Model	Video Resolution	Standard Quality	Enhanced Quality
MV21, MV71	720p	✔	✔
MV12, MV22(X), MV72(X)	720p	✔	✔
MV12, MV22(X), MV72(X)	1080p	✔	✔
MV32	1080p	✔
MV32	2058x2058	✔
MV2	720p	✔	✔
MV2	1080p	✔
MV52	720p	✔	✔
MV52	1080p	✔
MV63, MV63M, MV63X
MV93, MV93M, MV93X	1080p	✔	✔
MV13, MV13M	1080p	✔	✔
MV33, MV33M	1080p	✔	✔
MV23M, MV23X	1080p	✔	✔
MV73M, MV73X	1080p	✔	✔

Please see the Video Retention article for specific information regarding the minimum expected retention values per MV model.

Data Regions

Cloud archival data regions for cameras are determined based on the region chosen during Dashboard Organization creation. This process is documented here. Below is a table that outlines these data regions.

Organization Data Region	Cloud Archival Data Region
North America	United States
South America	United States
Europe	Germany
Asia	Japan
Canada	Canada

How Does Cloud Archive Work?

Once the Cloud Archive license is applied, the camera will start recording footage to the cloud for that 7, 30, 90, 180, or 365 days of 24/7 recording.
It will not upload or back up footage previously stored on the camera before the license was applied.
Copies of the video are stored on both the camera (not applicable to MV2) and the cloud. The on-camera recording does not change.
Video files stored in the cloud are always continuous, 24/7 footage.
The dashboard prioritizes the camera over the cloud for video retrieval (unless the camera is unreachable by the cloud or the timestamp of the requested video file is older than what is supported).
If the camera goes offline, it will still record footage as long as it has power, but the cloud will not back up this footage until it regains a connection to the WAN.
Only one Cloud Archive license can be attached to a camera. Cloud Archive licenses cannot be combined or stacked.

Note: Cloud Archive footage retention is determined by time duration rather than storage capacity. For example, a 7-day Cloud Archive license retains footage for a continuous period of seven days from the current date, rather than storing a cumulative seven days' worth of footage.

Note: During a WAN outage, a camera will only cache the last 30 minutes of video files for the cloud archive. Once connectivity is re-established, the camera will upload the cloud archive backlog. The camera's edge storage is not impacted during this type of outage.

Camera online

When cloud archive is enabled on a camera, and the camera is online, the data flow will follow the standard path: local and remote viewing devices will pull video directly from the camera's edge storage. A backup video file is stored in the cloud but not utilized in this case.

Camera offline

When the camera is offline, or the timestamp for the video file exceeds the camera's edge storage capacity, all video will be viewed as a remote stream, with the viewing devices retrieving video data from the cloud.

Cloud Archive Architecture

Meraki Cloud interfaces with AWS out of band to authenticate MV camera devices for cloud archive and sends a pre-signed authenticated URL to the cameras over a secure encrypted tunnel. MV cameras use this authenticated URL to communicate directly to AWS over TLS to upload video for backup.

MV cameras utilize an encrypted TLS connection to upload video directly to S3 using a pre-signed authenticated URL. This secure connection is encrypted and authenticated using TLS 1.2, ECDHE_RSA with X25519 and AES_256_GCM.

Cloud Archive Architecture

Cloud Archive - Security

Isolation in terms of tenants

Cloud Archive video storage follows a similar hierarchical structure as Meraki Dashboard. The S3 bucket in each data region is segmented by Dashboard Network and further segmented by each camera.

Data encryption during transit

MV cameras use TLS to upload video directly to S3 using a pre-signed authenticated URL. MV cameras utilize an encrypted TLS connection to upload video directly to S3 using a pre-signed authenticated URL. This secure connection is encrypted and authenticated using TLS 1.2, ECDHE_RSA with X25519 and AES_256_GCM.

All video access for video in S3 is through Meraki Dashboard over HTTPS including video fetched directly from S3.

Data encryption during transit

Data on S3 is protected by server-side encryption

Using Server-Side Encryption with KMS keys Stored in AWS Key Management Service (SSE-KMS), Amazon S3 encrypts your data at the object level as it writes it to disks in its data centers and decrypts it for you when you access it.

How to Configure

The following steps will enable a cloud archive for a Meraki MV

Note: The recommended MV firmware for cloud archive is MV 3.22 or higher

Renewing a license is the same process as assigning a new license, as outlined below.

Claim your MV cloud archive license by going to Organization> Configure > License Info.
Select Cameras > Monitor > Cameras and select a camera from the list.
Select Settings > Quality and Retention and select "Assign Cloud Archive License."

Assign Cloud Archive License

Choose a license from the available pool and select Assign.

Choose a license from the available pool

Since Cloud Archive licenses are assigned to a camera individually, they function as per-device licenses. As a result, the Cloud Archive licenses begin to "burn" down their term after they are assigned to the camera and not when claimed into your Organization.

The Cloud Archive Licenses added using the camera settings page will reflect on the Organization's license Info page.

The following steps will remove the cloud archive from a Meraki MV

From your Meraki Dashboard select Cameras > Monitor > Cameras and select a camera from the list that you need to remove cloud archive from.
Select Settings > Quality and Retention and select "Remove" under the Quality and retention heading and statement "Some settings on this camera cannot be modified because it has Cloud Archive enabled."
Select "Remove License"

Clout Arhive Remove Step 2.png

What happens when I remove the assigned Cloud Archive license?

When a cloud archive license is removed from the camera, the Cloud Archive functionality will continue to work for 24-hours from the time of un-assigning the license. This is meant to allow changes to your cloud-archive retention period without losing the previously stored video. This is also shown as a warning when removing the licenses.

What happens when I remove the assigned Cloud Archive license?

For 24 hours after the Cloud Archive license is removed, the following Quality and Retention settings will be grayed out and cannot be changed:

Motion-Based Retention
Recording Schedule
Video Quality

What happens when Cloud Archive licenses expire?

Since Cloud Archive licenses are assigned to each camera, they do not contribute to the single organization-wide license expiration even when using Meraki co-term licensing model. When the term associated with your Cloud Archive license expires, the license is invalidated, and the camera associated will stop backing up the video.

When are the assigned Cloud Archive licenses expiring?

The expiration date for cameras with assigned Cloud Archive licenses can be checked on the camera list page.

Navigate to Cameras > Monitor > Cameras. Select the wrench icon at the top right of the table.
Check the Cloud Archive Expiration checkbox to include expiry dates in the table
Cameras with Cloud Archive licenses will show the license expiration date.