Automated discovery of network camera in heterogeneous web pages

A method for indexing network camera data across heterogeneous web page structures, comprising:

• receiving a list of predetermined file formats associated with network camera data;
• generating a list of IP addresses associated with potential network cameras;
• transmitting a HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP) request to each of the IP addresses in the list, thereby invoking a response,
• waiting for a response from each of the IP addresses, wherein based on a response or lack of response from each IP address to the HTTP request determine if an IP address is i) a network camera thereby adding the corresponding IP address to a list of network cameras, ii) a website thereby adding the corresponding IP address to a list of websites to be further investigated, or iii) an IP address void of network camera information thereby skipping the IP address;
• and
• crawling the IP addresses that have been determined to be websites using a web crawler identifying IP addresses of network cameras and the IP address and resource path associated with network camera data and adding the identified IP addresses and resource paths to the list of network cameras.