Why is Video Surveillance Necessary?

Several years ago, I visited my brother in a different city. During my visit, someone had drill a hole in his neighbor's SUV's fuel tank. Apparently, someone wanted the $100 tank of gasoline for free, at the cost of the SUV's owner paying $5000 for a new gas tank.

A few year later, today, my family had been Thinking of Home Security due to an burglary encounter. While talking to my brother, he mentioned that the police had caught the gasoline burglar. The burglar had been stealing gasoline in that neighborhood. A police officer spotted a bucket under a vehicle and waited for the burglar.

After that experience, my brother felt having a video surveillance system is necessary to both deter neighborhood crime and to capture evidence when it happens. And after our burglary experience, I had to agree with him.

Cross-Reference
My brother had been looking at the Netgear Arlo home security system and recommended it to me. In fact, he ordered a set for me, which I will review in the "Netgear Arlo Review" article.

For one, having a video surveillance system is a great deterrent. It seems that no burglar would want to have their face captured and identified. Seeing a video surveillance system means that most burglars will move on to lower hanging fruits (houses without the video surveillance). Just surveying Amazon, I have found video surveillance system to be very inexpensive. An Elec four cameras system with a DVR, night vision, and Internet port is as affordable as $99 (see "Related Links" below).

This means that even fake video cameras and warning signs could be used as inexpensive deterrents. Having a deterrent is better than having nothing. Last I checked, a fake video camera is about $7 (see "Related Links" below). Most of us could afford several of these cameras to mount on our property. Unfortunately, with fake system, no evidence is captured when an intrusion does occur.

That brings us a full circle to say that a real video surveillance system is better, because it works as a deterrent and an evidence gathering device. But a burglar could bypass the video surveillance system in several ways: 1) wear a baseball hat; 2) wear a mask; 3) turn off the power. In order to avoid going on a tangent, we'll talk about combating each of these issues in separate threads. Watch our "TrackBack" section below to see when they are added.

TrackBack

Title: Does Wearing a Baseball Hat Defeat Video Surveillance?
Weblog: GearHack
Excerpt: In our previous thread, we discussed why video surveillance is necessary. From that discussion, we concluded that video cameras are normally mounted high up off the ground, to prevent tempering. That means a burglar could wear a baseball cap to avoid the face being captured on video. Theoretically, . . .
Tracked: Fri, 17 Apr 2015 03:29:54 +0400

Title: Mask Defeats Video Surveillance
Weblog: GearHack
Excerpt: In our why video surveillance is necessary discussion, we concluded that a masked burglar can prevent identification by wearing a mask. That's true, but it doesn't totally defeat the purpose of video surveillance. Capturing a burglar in the act provide various evidence: 1) you are actually being rob . . .
Tracked: Fri, 17 Apr 2015 03:38:40 +0400

Title: Power Keeps Your Security System Running
Weblog: GearHack
Excerpt: If you have seen any blockbuster heist movies recently, you might have noticed that the burglars always cut power during the heist. So along the same line of thinking, if a burglar is to molest your home, he/she should go to your fuse box and cut off the main power first. In the article, "Why is Vid . . .
Tracked: Tue, 21 Apr 2015 23:57:20 +0400

Why is Video Surveillance Necessary?

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