The dirty little secret in the security service marketplace is that a preponderance of alarms are false. The dirtier little secret is that false alarms are costing cities and customers billions (yes, that’s billions with a ‘B’) of dollars.
Current industry initiatives focused on decreasing false alarm dispatch rates rely on ‘enhanced call verification’ (where a second or third telephone call is made apart from the alarm site) and increasing fines for home and business owners. While effective, the alarm industry needs to take another significant leap forward in terms of adopting new solutions that help decrease the escalating costs being incurred by municipalities and customers alike. The goal of the Central Station Alarm Association’s (CSAA) standard is not only to help reduce the number of false dispatches but also to enhance information about the source of the alarm event, without requiring an on-site witness. This is where a concept called “verified response” was borne.
Verified response is a program that requires the alarm company to verify there is an unusual occurrence at the location of the alarm. Verified response is the result of a combination of factors. First, false alarms are incredibly common (some estimates are 94 to 98 percent of all alarms). Second, it’s expensive in both real and collateral costs for municipalities to respond to every single alarm when the majority is false. In 1998, for example, police responded to approximately 38 million alarm activations, at an estimated annual cost of $1.5 billion.
In other words, without some sort of human or visual verification, the police aren’t coming. Municipalities that have adopted verified response include Las Vegas, Salt Lake City, Milwaukee, Dallas and dozens of others in the United States and Canada. For owners of home or small business security systems, if the alarm is triggered at 2 a.m., without some sort of human or visual verification – the police are still not coming.
The verified response issue has strong opinions on either side of it. Most proponents are law enforcement officials, like Los Angles Police Department Chief William Bratton, who cite high false alarm rates are costing their cities valuable time and money. For example, responding to alarms cost the Fremont, Calif., police department about $688,000 in 2004, which reflects the cost of two officers showing up at homes when the alarm typically went off by mistake. Bratton has been quoted as estimating that as much as 15 percent of officers’ time was being wasted by false alarms.
However, many cities that have adopted verified response have seen burglary rates jump, at least initially. For example, in Dallas, business burglaries in March 2006 increased 17.9 percent compared to March 2005.
Most home and business owners recognize the dangers of having to verify an intruder themselves. However, there are new technologies that security monitoring companies can integrate with existing systems that use the Internet to send video feeds directly to the monitoring company once an alarm is triggered. The monitoring station personnel can use video surveillance cameras installed at the home or business to view “in real time” whether there is an actual break-in, and alert police.
Most security industry experts agree that verifying an alarm signal by a monitoring central station will drastically reduce false dispatches. However, most central stations are heavily invested in public switched telephone network technology, and lack the resources or experience to efficiently integrate new technologies with existing infrastructure. OzVision Secure Network, created by Massachusetts-based OzVision, includes several features aimed at eliminating technological barriers to ensure seamless connectivity, including “plug and play” functionality that reduces the time required to install video equipment and connect to the central station. It was created to enable service providers to meet new market requirements driven by verified response, broadband adoption and limited integration of closed-circuit television (CCTV) and alarm systems. It provides an affordable, reliable, high-performance remote video solution that can deliver real-time security monitoring features to subscribers through a branded, Internet-based portal that is accessible via personal computer, personal digital assistant or cell phone.
OSN facilitates the seamless delivery of a complete suite of video services over Internet Protocol-based networks and provides a “no risk” entry for central stations into the video services market, a largely untapped revenue source. As a result, central stations can apply OzVision’s hosted service model to capture new customers quickly, at a low cost while leveraging current investments in technology infrastructure and automation software.
Verified response will eventually be the only way to get a police officer to the crime scene. Now is the time to implement the best technological solutions to ensure that the crime happening (or not) is the real deal.
