The Cobra seal is a low-cost, tamper-indicating device that is used in the commercial safeguards industry to provide in situ verification capabilities. The seal consists of a clear, one-piece polycarbonate seal body and a loop of fiber optic cable. The seal is placed by looping the fiber optic cable through the locking mechanism of the container or site to be sealed and then inserting the cable ends into the seal body. Installation tools are used to secure the Cobra seal body to the fiber optic cable. Two clamping pins secure the cable in the seal body and a specially designed cutting blade cuts the fiber optic cable in a random manner, creating a unique signature that can be viewed and recorded by the Cobra III Seal Imaging System. Seal verification can be performed at a later time by comparing a new image of a seal to a reference image taken when the seal was originally installed. Any differences found may indicate that the seal has been tampered with.

COBRA III SEAL IMAGING SYSTEM

The Cobra III Seal Imaging System is required to perform a review of the Cobra seal for tamper inspection. This highly portable seal inspection station is suitable for on-site inspections and is designed to photograph, view, and print images of seals for review and tamper inspection. The Cobra III Seal Imaging System consists of a Nikon^® Coolpix^® 995 digital camera, HP^® PhotoSmart^® 130 color printer, CANBERRA proprietary optics, an illumination and alignment accessory, and a portable power pack.

The seal review process is very simple. A seal is inserted into the Cobra III's seal receptacle and a photograph of the fiber optic cable ends is taken using the Nikon Coolpix 995 digital camera. The camera's own built-in liquid crystal monitor serves as a viewfinder when photographing seal images and can also be used to display stored images. The Coolpix 995 camera can digitally store up to 2526 seal images in Basic Mode, which may be archived using the included HP PhotoSmart 130 printer or transferred to a PC (not included) using a Windows®-based user interface program (included). The PhotoSmart 130 printer is a four-color inkjet printer which produces full color, high-quality image printing directly from the Coolpix 995 digital camera (via USB), a CompactFlash^® card, or a PC. Once the captured images are printed, the seal images can then be manually reviewed for physical differences by comparing the photographs taken of the seal's fiber optic cable ends. CANBERRA proprietary optics, seal illumination, and seal receptacle are designed to provide a consistent image over a wide range of fiber optic length and seal construction. The real time video display provides the inspector the opportunity for manipulation of the seal in the camera body to optimize the image.

The portable power pack included with the system uses readily available "D" size alkaline batteries. This will provide power for a full working day of heavy usage. If required, the system can be powered by standard carbon- zinc cells, which will provide lower endurance. Each Cobra III Seal Imaging System comes with a "QuickStart Sheet," which includes brief instructions for operations most common to inspection applications. Factory instruction manuals for the Nikon Coolpix 995 digital camera and HP PhotoSmart 130 printer are also provided for more detailed information not covered by the QuickStart sheet.