This paper discusses the challenges faced when bringing together multiple disparate surveillance video archives to support semantic analysis and search and describes the SAVASA framework for enabling better integration of CCTV archives. The proliferation of CCTV cameras managed by public institutions and private enterprise raises a number of issues relating to data security, privacy, ethics and technological difficulties in unifying the variety of data and formats. These are often the result of misunderstandings between the involved parties and include concerns such as reliability and security of cloud technology, accuracy and privacy in automatic semantic annotation of video and ultimate responsibility over content in the digital age. In this paper we present outcomes from the SAVASA project that aims to develop a standards-based video archive search platform allowing authorised users to query over remote and non-interoperable video archives of CCTV footage from geographically diverse locations.