What a System Should Do
There are many benefits to a good home surveillance system. The system should deter criminals, protect you when you’re home, alert you to events, and provide rock solid evidence should something happen. All the while, your security camera system should be easy to install, easy to use and definitely earn you some bragging rights of being able to say, “They picked the wrong place to mess with.” Unfortunately, many people purchase a video surveillance camera system blindly from a consultant, dealer or website and often have regrets. A good system should be able to identify the suspect and document activity thoroughly.
Identification of the Suspect
Even if the funds you have to spend on a surveillance system are limited, you must make it a point to get a system that is able to clearly identify people as they come and go. Odds are that if something happens at your home or business that is noteworthy, you’ll know about it. And the only question you need to answers is: “Who did it?” If you know who is coming and going, figuring out “who” is in most cases very simple. To achieve good identification of people or vehicles, you must identify the choke points in your business and the likely avenues of approach. By choke points, I mean areas of your home, business or property that anyone or thing wishing to gain entrance must pass through. Good examples are obviously doors, windows, gates, parking lot entrances etc. Video security cameras dedicated to watching these choke points will put the bad guy’s mug shot in your hands before you even have to involve the police.
You might try to think like a criminal. If you were a burglar, how would you enter your home or property? Would your approach be different during the day than at night? What areas on the property are least visible to your neighbors? The results of this exercise will confirm the number of security cameras you need to rest easy and will likely surprise you.
Documentation of Activity
It is not enough to be able to identify a suspect in home surveillance. There are simply too many instances that call for documentation of what happened during an attempted theft. An easy case in point is shoplifting. By law in most states, a suspect must be observed actually concealing an item and leaving the threshold of the building before the activity is considered a crime.
Additionally, and many times more importantly, documentation of activity in your home or place of business will help to protect you from prosecution for “Slip and Fall”, and other litigious activities that may occur on your property. At a residence, using surveillance cameras which view a wide area often provide some very valuable clues beyond identification, such as the direction of travel, a vehicle description, identifying accomplices and neighbors that may have witnessed the crime. In many cases, you can gain many of these important details with as few as four additional cameras located around your house. Safety is another popular reason to have security cameras providing overviews of your property. It’s quite a comfort to be able to watch children at play in the pool, trampoline or yard knowing they are safe and having fun at the same time.