Are there any Law Enforcement agencies that have implemented a way to video verify an alarm at Police Dispatch or Real Time Crime Center?
With such a high percentage of false alarms that Police Departments receive anyway, are there any thoughts on the drawbacks?
This is usually not done by the police department itself, but by a video monitoring company that receives the alarm.
Sometimes the verification video comes from a camera near the alarm sensor, where video is pulled from a recorder at a time that corresponds to the alarm time (e.g.: if the "Front Door" contact tripped at 11:05:06PM, video from the "Lobby" camera might be retrieved from 11:05:01 (5 seconds of pre-alarm video) to 11:05:16 (10 seconds of post-alarm video).
In other cases video analytics are used to generate an event and alarm clip directly (the "Lobby" camera would have a rule to alarm on a person in the field of view after 9PM).
Particularly in larger cities there is a trend for police to not respond to unverified alarms, or to respond at a low priority (without verification they will check the site out as part of their general rounds, with verification they will alter their route to go immediately to the site).
As Brian has pointed out, lots of low cost technology is available for remote witness of site activity…. Audio, video, analytics, etc. But very little is used for interaction directly between public police and private alarms.
Back Story: “False Alarms” is a problem owned by the alarm industry. It results in “UPR/ Unnecessary Police Response”, a problem owned by law enforcement. Police departments do not have a responsibility to provide emergency response to nuisance calls for help (unwitnessed, unknown) from private monitoring firms, like ADT/ Moni/ EM24 (+2000 others). For decades, local cops have been responding on-demand to calls from private monitoring firms, as a privileged political courtesy, not as a right of the taxpayer citizen alarm site. The alarm industry has abused that courtesy by not controlling the near total error/false alarms (millions of deterrent systems without remote witness technologies). Law enforcement is now saying “no more” and taking back their resources (up to 18 % of budgets have been dedicated to unnecessary alarm response). Withdrawal of police response for private alarms systems is causing the traditional business models, and RMR market value to collapse, without any disruption of public safety. Lots of incentive to let private security be private security.
Source: Lee Jones; Support Services Group; LeeSSG@att.net
What are some good options for video verification? We have a city here who is fining dealers and recently announced they will not respond to calls that originate from 39 alarm companies since they refuse to pay the fine.
The issue is the city has bypassed the homeowner and is making the dealer responsible for EVERY false alarm. Forgot password, hit panic on remote by accident, etc, all items beyond the dealer's control.
We work with ADC and our monitoring station supports video pushed to them but they can not check live video. So that means they only see a 30-second clip of the camera associated with that sensor.
I am looking for something where the Central can check on various cameras to follow an intruder etc.
Sounds like Sandy Springs GA, which is getting national attention.
I am low tech and not an attorney, so put my observations in proper perspective.
This new “false alarm ordinance” is not too uncommon, but is in “conflict” with traditional outdated monitoring business models. Sandy Springs alarm suppliers knew the rules, and decided to resist. The Penalty was known in advance, “cease and desist”. If you are a customer without police response, don’t blame the city, blame the alarm supplier!
We believe several of the alarm associations are using this matter for a stunt to attract donations, and is applying bullying tactics to test the local muni administration, all of which could stunt the market and market value of RMR.
Many of the disputed issues have already been litigated and resolved elsewhere across the country. Here are several examples out of dozens. Seattle PD has been charging monitoring companies, not the alarm site, for every alarm response, no freebies, for over 10 years. San Francisco has required monitoring firms to pay a permit fee for each alarm site, for over 10 years. More upon request. Hundreds of cities all across the country have some variation of Verified Response, Subsidy Recovery, Broadcast & File. Even the state of Georgia has statewide legislation that lowered the priority for alarm response by banning licensed monitoring firms from calling the police, until they try to interact with the customer first. Some of the specific language in the Sandy Springs ordinance may be sloppy, but not unusual. The litigation should help the city refine the document, not dilute it.
Remember, most modern municipalities are seeking highest and best use of their resources by following basic “ 911 rules and protocols”. Historically, 911 call centers have been forced to “bend those rules” to accommodate the demands of the traditional alarm industry… unnecessary response to nuisance deterrent type property alarms .
Back to your question about hardware and technology. Most licensed monitoring firms know all about the latest and greatest stuff. They just are not motivated to update from their outdated business model. However, basic business models have become so fragmented (such as third party monitoring) that the owner of the RMR contract has less control over the overall process. Maybe push your monitoring source to go to ISC West later this week, or get a different monitoring firm.
Source: Lee Jones; Support Services Group; LeeSSG@att.net
I forgot another very important operational issue ... the customer. Remember it is interactive between the monitoring center and the customer site. The site will remain a low priority or no response “dumb deterrent alarm system” unless it is upgraded with audio, video, analytical technology. Somebody needs to make it happen and pay the costs.
Lee,
Do you see the customer paying for this?
What if it video Verification was offered to them at no additional charge? How likely would they be to sign up?
Good marketing question…
Very important if a commercial account, or specialty residential, with something of value to steal or disrupt. RMR market value of that account would probably increase and with lower attrition. If typical residential, the deterrent alarm systems would do the job without greater cost to either party, or privacy issues. We would expect an existing $30 RMR (average) residential “deterrent” system now to be priced at half @ $15 (customer notification vs police notification). Note, current market value of RMR would be halved too…. Maybe justification for most customers to be remote witness?... the new business model? Preparing the next generation for a stronger public/private partnership.
Law enforcement does not care who is calling if they are witnessing a 911 type emergency…. licensed monitoring or retired school teacher… emergency response is justified. Market penetration of households with DIY / MIY and licensed monitoring will certainly increase…. stuck on 20-25% for years. “Customer Notification” will be the incentive to buy/sell lots of consumer electronics. As we know, customer notification can quickly turn into police notification.
It is Sandy Springs that I was referring to.
So I guess in summary, the industry is selling an idea that when the alarm goes off and the central calls local law enforcement, there will be an immediate response. But we pretty much know there will be no immediate response.
Is it time to start pushing video verification?
Do we risk losing sales because customers do not want to pay more for video hardware and verification?
What about image sensors? Are still images sufficient for a central?
I also wonder how long it takes for a video to get to the central, and if they wait on that video before calling the contacts on the list?
Our central supports video pushes from Alarm.com but they can not see live video. I understand the reason why, but is that standard? I would want my central to view all the cameras in case of an alarm. I want them to see if an intruder walked by any of the cameras.
There is PSIM software that handles both the push and the live video for verification
The company I work for does Video Verification and we typically see response times within 30 minutes depending on city/state. However we do strictly commercial work and the S.O.P. for dispatching is to inform the operator that we have video verification of trespassing/vandalism/theft/ect...
We don't really do burglar alarms so I don't have a good comparison on response times of non-video verified responses, but the police do respond to the internal building alarm when they go off.
There are many police departments looking at what Detroit implemented with project Green Light. The police department has real time video feed from locations that want to be apart of the program. This gives them the verification before sending officers and lets them know what the officers are walking into. Below is a link to the project.
Dave,
Project Green Light has been used for more after the event evidence.
They are getting a lot slack for giving faster response times to people who pay for the service of connecting their cameras.
Here is a very good article about this program:
Project Green Light faces scrutiny as Detroit eyes mandate for thousands of businesses
Good point, I can see that Detroit Police are using this as an additional tax revenue. I also see many benefits of other departments and municipals able to learn from this. I see an overall benefit as sometimes in law enforcement it is very difficult to get access to systems to obtain video and images of suspect when time is critical. This program at minimal allows for quick access.
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