You’re in the midst of a family dinner and your phone buzzes. It’s a security alert telling you that movement has been detected on-site. As the company’s on-call Operations Engineer, you’ve seen it happen a million times. It’s probably a false alarm, so you ignore it. No big deal. Besides, the last 42 alerts were false, so the odds are in your favour.
We’ve all heard the story about “The Boy Who Cried Wolf”.
Alert-based monitoring tends to have the same affect. Motion detectors can be set off by something as simple as a poster coming loose from a wall or a bug crawling over a sensor. Loose-fitting doors and windows can also trigger an alert-based system to register a false positive. Each and every alert should matter because it could lead to a crisis that could potentially cause major financial loss to your company.
In the past, Police would be dispatched to investigate any alarm, but as of September 2018, Police in Niagara, Toronto, and London will no longer respond to burglar alarms without visual, audible, or eyewitness proof of criminal activity. With 95% – 97% of alarms being false, it’s put a burden on critical emergency resources. Last year, Hamilton Police responded to over 4,700 alarm calls alone. The new requirement was implemented to make emergency responses more efficient. With alarm overload fatiguing many companies, making the switch to a continuous live monitoring system will guarantee that every alert is legitimate.
Caliber Communications’ live monitoring staff focuses on early detection in order to prevent crime before it occurs. The moment a potential security breach is detected and verified, a detailed alert will notify the property owner and appropriate action is immediately taken by the live operators. Caliber’s technology allows live monitoring staff to trigger sirens and strobe lights in attempt to deter criminals. They can even communicate with the individual(s) through live two way speakers and demand them to vacate the premises. If the initial attempts to deter intruders are unsuccessful, the monitoring staff have the frame-by-frame images and high quality video footage available to support an immediate police dispatch and investigation.
The average burglary lasts less than 10 minutes. By the time an alert-based monitoring systems notifies the owner of a disturbance, it’s often too late to take significant action. To receive police response, the owner would have to review surveillance footage and pinpoint when the break in occurred which could be time-consuming and unfortunately opens a large window for theft and immense loss for owners.