False Alarm Perspectives

Section 1: False Alarms in Perspective

False alarms, nuisance alarms, false activations, false relays. By whatever name, undesired activations of burglar alarms aggravate and confound police departments, alarm companies, alarm users, and local governments. The problem of "false alarms" (the most common term) is old but getting worse, and many parties have called for an increase in efforts to combat the problem. However, it's a complex issue. Definitions and solutions are slippery, with different factions holding many opposing views.

This document, produced under the auspices of the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) with funding assistance from the National Burglar and Fire Alarm Association (NBFAA) and the Central Station Alarm Association (CSAA), does not purport to solve the problem of false alarms. Nor does it attempt to say everything that can be said about the subject. Instead, it serves as a resource to which interested parties can turn for an overview, a compilation of relevant state laws, a sample of local ordinances, a roundup of court decisions, a look at private response to alarms, and a list of helpful organizations and publications. IACP hopes readers will use this document to determine the best solutions for their own states and communities.

What is a false alarm? Some definitions of false alarms include all alarm signals that occur when no intrusion has been attempted; other definitions restrict the category to include only alarm signals that are caused by user or mechanical error but not those caused by severe weather, power outages, or telephone line disorders.

Further distinctions include "nuisance alarms," which are unwanted alarm system activations in which a sensor properly responds to a stimulus, but the stimulus is not a burglar. "True false alarms" are system activations due to mechanical defects. "False dispatches" are unnecessary requests for police assistance; they may result from nuisance alarms, true false alarms, or errors by alarm monitoring stations. Many other terms are used and distinctions made.

Significantly, the fact that an alarm system mistakenly sends a signal to a central station (false alarm) does not necessarily require that police be called (false dispatch). Some solutions to the "false alarm" problem focus on reducing the number of times central stations call police rather than the number of times alarm systems send signals to central stations. Other solutions focus on making alarm systems "smarter" so that central station operators need not be burdened with deciding whether to call the police.

In addition, some parties would like to see the category of canceled alarms included in statistics. A canceled alarm occurs when a central station calls police dispatchers to say that the alarm just reported is now known to be false and the police therefore need not travel to the scene. Police worry that criminals may cancel dispatches once they hear an alarm; alarm companies claim they could reduce police dispatches if police departments would accept cancellations. Various methods--including transfer of incident and dispatcher numbers and the use of custom computer software--are being tried in an attempt to ensure that cancellations are genuine.

The particular type of false alarm this paper is concerned with is the type that causes police to travel unnecessarily to an alarm site--for whatever reason. To stay within common parlance, this paper will describe that type of alarm with the most common term, "false alarm," whenever it is not essential to use a different term.

How common are false alarms? Almost everyone agrees they are too common, but exactly how common depends on definition and point of view. The usual way to quantify false alarms is to express them as a percentage of all alarm calls. Looked at that way, 95 percent to 98 percent of all alarm calls are false--that is, they do not indicate an actual or attempted intrusion. That view makes the problem look abominable.

Neither view reflects the situation quite accurately. The real problem for police is not the false alarm rate but the number of unnecessary calls for service--that's what wastes their time. If a city with 10,000 installed alarm systems experiences 100 alarm-related calls for police service, and 98 of those calls are unfounded, the false alarm rate is 98 percent. Yet having to respond 98 times over the course of a year does not constitute a major problem, and in fact the vast majority of alarm systems did what they were supposed to do.

On the other hand, merely examining the number of false calls per system per year leaves the problem somewhat unilluminated. By one estimate, 7 percent of U.S. homes and 40 percent of U.S. businesses have alarm systems, for a total of 7 million systems. Other estimates run as high as 15 million installed systems. If each generates only one false call for police response annually, that's still 7 million to 15 million unnecessary police runs. In some regions, alarm calls account for 10 percent to 30 percent of all calls for police service. Even discounting troublesome systems that send an inordinate number of false alarms, the occasional false alarm from almost every system adds up to a large number of calls.

Moreover, a figure of one false police notification per system per year is probably low. CSAA estimates there are about 2.2 false alarms per system per year now overall. Of course, some cities with aggressive false alarm reduction programs encounter much lower rates.

Unchecked, the problem will snowball along with the steadily increasing number of alarm system installations. Populous cities already typically experience tens of thousands of false alarm calls annually; the largest cities dispatch police to hundreds of thousands of false alarms each year.

How long have false alarms been a problem? As long ago as 1882, when Mark Twain wrote a short story called "The McWilliamses and the Burglar Alarm," false alarms have been cause for discussion. After describing the miseries he suffered from "three or four hundred false alarms" from his residential alarm system, the narrator concludes, "Yes, sir, a burglar alarm combines in its person all that is objectionable about a fire, a riot, and a harem, and at the same time none of the compensating advantages, of one sort or another, that customarily belong with that combination."

That is not to say the false alarm situation has inhabited its current plane for more than a century. Today's high level of false alarms follows rapid growth in the alarm industry in the 1970s, `80s, and `90s. The growth in installed systems was based on such factors as declining prices for alarm systems, the introduction of retail sales of alarm equipment, and increased fear of crime. Those factors seem unlikely to disappear anytime soon; most indicators suggest more and more businesses and residences will have alarm systems installed.

What causes false alarms? The three main causes are technological errors, installation errors, and user errors. Engineers familiar with alarm technology note that new equipment made by the better manufacturers rarely causes true false alarms (that is, when a sensor trips the alarm even though nothing was there to sense). The necessary design changes have already been made. Technological errors appear to be on the decrease.

Installation errors (for example, use of particular types of sensors in inappropriate places) still account for a significant percentage of false alarms. Some installers know what they are doing; others do not. Many states require licensing of security equipment installers, but the specific licensing requirements are not always rigorous. Installation errors continue to cause false alarms.

User errors are generally held to cause the greatest percentage of false alarms. Numerous surveys have attributed 40 percent to 60 percent of false alarms to mistakes by users. One study recently found 75 percent of false alarms to be caused by user error. Inadequate user training and the complexity of some alarm system controls are often cited as causes of user-initiated false alarms.

Numerous other factors--a lack of maintenance, changes in the layout of the protected site, and the continued use of older, less reliable systems and sensors--cause false alarms. The Canadian Alarm and Security Association (CANASA) lists 30 causes:

Equipment-Related

Defective Installation
1. Poor placement
2. Inherently high false risk
3. Unstable equipment
4. Misused equipment

   Improper Installation

5. Installed wrong
6. Exceeded equipment limits
7. Sensitivity set too high
8. Misapplied equipment

   Wearing Out

9. Electronic failure
10. Resistance increase
11. Physically loosened

    Environmental Disturbance

12. Weather
13. Adjacent construction
14. Machinery/decoration
15. Power loss

    Line Supervision

16. Bell problems

    Human-Related

    Improper operation procedure
17. Improper/incomplete training
18. New employee/cleaners/ friend/relative
19. Testing procedure

    Wrong code or key

20. Memory failure
21. Loss of passcard

    Improper station procedures

22. Installer forgot to send to station
23. Station lost data sheet
24. Station misentered data
25. Misdirected procedures

    Misprogramming control

26. Wrong account number
27. Misprogrammed account number (A vs. O)
28. Wrong codes used
29. Wrong format
30. Wrong receiver number

Why exactly is the current rash of false alarms a problem for police? Expense-conscious police departments recognize that alarms have a cost. They consume officer time, waste fuel, increase the risk of accidents, cause wear and tear on equipment, reduce police service to areas with a greater need for officer presence, and over time erode officer caution. The frustration level among some police chiefs is high. An article in Security Dealer quotes one chief as saying,

We have a false alarm ordinance, and 98 percent of our alarms are false. We have gotten it down to 90 percent periodically, but it is still a serious manpower problem. We have a committee of alarm companies, police officers, and citizens working on the problem. We've tried everything (e.g., punitive damages, inspections, etc.) and it's not getting the job done. It's a huge problem, and we don't know how it's going to turn out in the future.

Some law enforcement officials find excessive alarm response incompatible with their mission. Police Magazine quotes the executive director of the Police Executive Research Forum as saying, "So much of what the police departments do is for the benefit of some industry. And this [alarm response] is just another example of it. These private entrepreneurs are making a profit off the police."

The view that police are being asked to subsidize private businesses (alarm companies) raises the competing question of whether private businesses and homeowners are being asked to subsidize (through user fees and fines) a legitimate request for a public service.

False alarms waste police time but are not unique in that regard. When someone calls to report a trespasser in the back yard, and it's actually the gas meter reader, that's a false alarm. By one measure, more than half of all calls for police service are not crime-related.

Why bother using alarms at all? False alarms aggravate police, alarm companies, and alarm users. But, as consumer items, alarm systems wouldn't exist if they provided no benefit. The alarm industry claims alarm systems help police capture criminals in the act, leading to a higher conviction rate with less need for police investigation than would be the case without alarms; alarmed premises are also said to be less vulnerable to criminal attempts than other premises. Studies have borne out both conclusions.

Even law enforcement representatives who often find false alarms a costly nuisance--grant that alarm systems serve a useful purpose. The report Private Security by the Law Enforcement Assistance Administration's Private Security Task Force states, "Alarms offer a proven method for crime reduction andcriminal apprehension."

Similarly, in a survey of 1,000 police and fire chiefs, 85 percent of the police officials said security systems decrease the likelihood a home will be burglarized; almost 90 percent felt security systems increase their chances of apprehending burglars; and 85 percent said they encourage the installation of electronic security systems in residences and businesses in their communities.

See Where Do All These Alarm Systems Come From?

Research has also shown the economic benefit of alarm system use. One study compares the cost of response to the losses avoided and demonstrates that alarms are a positive benefit to a community--not even counting, of course, the unquantifiable benefits of lower crime and a lower fear of crime.

False alarms are a nuisance but perhaps are not the underlying problem. As one alarm company owner puts it, "False alarms are the side effect of a cure for the problem of burglary."

What types of solutions are out there? Given the multitude of alleged solutions to the false alarm problem, one might think the issue had been settled long ago. Research turns up scores of practices that are touted as ways to reduce false alarms, and most of them have been tried in one locale or another, yet obviously the problem has not been solved. The tenacity of the problem shows there is no silver bullet that will stop false alarms in their tracks, at least not yet, at least not at a cost that the parties involved are willing to bear.

Solutions fall into several major categories:

• technical (improved alarm technology and installation)
• customer education and public awareness
• training of installers and police crime-prevention personnel
• regulation of alarm companies and installers
• alarm control ordinances
• police alarm response policies

Naturally, what works in one city won't necessarily work in another, and even the best of the solutions have only succeeded in cutting a city's number of false alarms in half. Nevertheless, here are some specific measures thought to be valuable in the fight against false alarms:

• Verification. Central stations use several types of verification--telephone, audio ("listen in"), and video--in an attempt to contact an authorized person at the user's site after an alarm has been received. The goal is to detect whether the alarm was tripped accidentally. If the central station determines it was, a police call can be avoided. Some parties, such as CSAA and NBFAA, favor verification as a false alarm reduction means except for holdup and duress alarms.
  However, others deem it unnecessary on the grounds that a user who accidentally trips an alarm can readily call the central station to cancel it. They also fear that verification's delay of police response could be dangerous.
• User training. Since a large proportion of false alarms is caused by user error, training users--and, in the case of commercial users, their employees--on the proper use of alarm systems is a sensible false alarm reduction measure. NBFAA describes four basic strategies for subscriber education:
  
  1. Install systems with features that alert subscribers to potential false alarms before signals are transmitted.
  2. Provide initial and ongoing instruction. Use plenty of decals and instruction sheets.
  3. Educate or drop users who cause an inordinate number of false alarms.
  4. Mount a public awareness campaign involving law enforcement officials.
  NBFAA also advises alarm companies to urge law enforcement officials and local alarm associations to send problem users letters that explain the gravity of false alarms. CANASA recommends that municipalities mount their own false alarm reduction public awareness campaigns using general municipal funds plus fees derived from alarm users.
• Installer training. Unwisely installed alarm systems are more prone to generate false alarms than wisely installed systems. To improve installer training, in the late 1980s NBFAA introduced the National Training School for training and certifying alarm technicians. Courses are offered through NBFAA chapters throughout the United States.
  Some parties believe the answer to improving installer training is state certification by exam. To maintain certification, installers might be required to participate in continuing education (as lawyers and doctors are), and complaint review boards could be established and granted the power to strip installers of their certification.
• Local ordinances and state laws. Perhaps 2,000 cities and counties employ false alarm laws, as do half a dozen states. Do false alarm ordinances reduce the number of false alarms? Of the 30 ordinances examined in Section 3, most are reported to have reduced the false alarm problem somewhat. The degree of reduction ranges from insignificant to 50 percent or more.
  Most ordinances allow a fixed number of "free" false alarms before imposing a series of fines. After that, the features are unpredictable. Among the other terms of various false alarm reduction ordinances are the following:
  • users must register their alarm systems
  • after a certain number of false alarms, users must prove they have repaired their systems
  • police may set a policy of not responding to particular users' alarms after a certain number of false calls
  • users must provide police with names of persons who can come to the alarm site with keys and the ability to reset the alarm
  • alarm companies must verify alarms by one method or another before summoning police
  • alarm installers must be trained and registered
  • users or alarm companies whose systems generate false alarms must pay service charges or user fees as opposed to actual fines
  Opinion on using laws to control false alarms varies widely. Some parties consider ordinances indispensable: they provide an organized way to address the false alarm issue; their alarm registration requirements make it possible to track the success of false alarm reduction efforts; and they keep alarm users within reasonable limits. Others parties look at alarm ordinances as a last resort: they often are developed without the advice of the users and alarm companies they regulate, and they might reduce alarm use.
  If the false alarm issue is addressed by law, should that be at the state or local level? The point is much debated. One side claims that because policing in the United States is decentralized and cities vary from one to the next, the false alarm problem must be solved with local ordinances. The other side says alarm companies cannot be expected to comply with hundreds of differing local ordinances within a single state, so state law is best. There have even been calls for national regulation.
• Fines. Most major cities and many smaller ones employ ordinances that levy fines for excessive false alarms. Those fines range from tens to hundreds of dollars per false alarm. Like most false alarm reduction measures, fines are much debated. Supporters say fines give alarm users an incentive to learn to use their systems correctly and to test, repair, upgrade, and maintain their systems. Fines also produce revenue that can be used to support false alarm reduction activities by police departments and governments.
  Detractors note that just as parking fines have not eliminated illegal parking, false alarm fines will not eliminate false alarms. Wealthier alarm users will pay even high fines willingly, while other users and potential users may be discouraged from using alarm systems at all. There may also be legal challenges to levying fines without providing users with a hearing at which it is determined whether a particular alarm signal really was false (see Section 4).
• Permits. Alarm permits provide a mechanism whereby governments and law enforcement agencies track alarm system use and enforce standards. Few people believe alarm permits alone reduce false alarms. Some parties feel that the effort necessary to administer a permit system detracts from energies that could better be spent in controlling false alarms more directly.
  Some private companies provide the service of administering permits and collecting fines for municipalities. Such a service lifts the administrative burden from the municipality and generates revenue. Some parties fear that false alarm reduction programs may become just another form of municipal revenue-generation; others approve of the fee collection on the grounds that false alarm reduction programs should pay for themselves.
• Nonresponse. Some law enforcement agencies will not respond to unverified alarm calls from a particular system after they have received a certain number of false alarms from that system and will resume service only after a specified period or after seeing proof that the system has been repaired or the problem otherwise solved (for example, through user training). Other departments are reluctant to practice nonresponse; instead they revoke a user's permit and, while still responding to subsequent alarm calls, treat those calls as misdemeanors. Many departments feel duty-bound to respond to alarm calls no matter what.
  The biggest concern regarding nonresponse is over what happens when a legitimate, serious alarm call is relayed to the police and, because it comes from an alarm system that has no permit, the police don't investigate. Though rare, incidents like that have happened. In one case, a residential alarm user who was faced with a dangerous intruder activated a panic signal. A central station relayed the alarm to police, who chose not to respond because the user had no permit. The alarm user was raped by the intruder.
• Private response. Private response to alarms has been practiced for years. Sometimes it is done to comply with insurance or other standards. In other cases, neighborhood associations contract with private responders to obtain faster response than the police provide.
  Some law enforcement personnel are happy to turn the responsibility for alarm response over to someone else. Others feel, however, that private response is an encroachment on their turf. Many parties are concerned about the level of training that private responders typically receive and about the dangers those responders may face--or pose--when they arrive at the scene of a burglary.
• Time-of-day differentiation. False alarms are most likely to occur around the times when people turn their systems on and off--that is, when they enter and leave a building. Some police departments use that knowledge to treat alarm calls differently depending on when they are received. For example, in Calgary, during business hours alarm companies must perform telephone verification of commercial alarms before calling the police. However, at night the police respond without verification.
  It is also possible to designate some alarm signals as entry or exit alarms, meaning alarms that occur within one or two minutes of when an alarm system was turned on or off. By placing some alarms in that category, central stations can give police an opportunity to assign those alarms a lower response priority. It's an application of risk management that follows from the assumption that a burglary is unlikely to begin, say, 30 seconds after an alarm user leaves the premises.
• Standards. Some parties, such as Professional Alarm Services Organizations of North America (PASONA), feel false alarms would be greatly reduced if alarm systems were designed, manufactured, installed, tested, maintained, and used in accordance with national standards and codes. PASONA encourages police chiefs to ask for ordinances that require compliance with the Underwriters Laboratories (UL) burglar alarm system certificate program.
  In that program, central stations apply to be listed by UL. Then, if they choose, they can apply for a UL certificate for each alarm system they serve. UL enforces standards by inspecting the central station and a statistical sample of alarm system installations. Proponents claim UL standards benefit alarm users and the police departments that respond to their alarms.
  Opponents of that approach view required adherence to national standards as yet another layer of regulation to endure. They also point to the costs associated with meeting those standards and the cost of inspections.
  UL claims that municipalities that have adopted its certificate program for fire alarms have cut their false alarms by 80 percent to 90 percent. As yet, no municipalities are known to have adopted the UL certificate program for burglar alarms. For authorities who wish to know which central stations and which alarm installations are UL listed and certificated, UL offers an on-line database. (See Section 6: Resources.)
  Standards related to false alarms are also being developed by the Security Industry Association. Its standards for passive infrared sensors address environmental causes of false alarms; its control panel standards address human error; and its glassbreak standards address the location, environment, and acoustics of glassbreak detectors. SIA is also studying other technologies, as well as improved product manuals for installers and end users.
• Codes. In an effort to raise the quality of alarm installation and ensure the use of high-quality equipment, there have been calls for the introduction of municipal codes for alarm systems. Like building codes and fire codes, alarm system codes would specify methods and materials and would be enforced through approval processes and site inspections. Alarm codes could also be incorporated into existing building codes and be enforced by current inspectors.
• Repair or upgrading requirements. Many local ordinances allow police to suspend response for users whose systems cause excessive false alarms. Response is only reinstated after those users show they have taken steps to correct whatever was causing the false alarms.
  It's possible to take that idea a step farther. Richard Mellard of the National Crime Prevention Institute has suggested a set of ascending requirements for upgrading alarm systems after each false alarm. For example, after a user's first false alarm, an upgrade to sensor identification could be required. That way, at the next false alarm, technicians would know which sensor caused the problem. After a user's second false alarm, second or third event dispatching (accumulation) could be required--that is, the system would not alarm simply from one event but would require that two or three sensors trip before it transmits an alarm.
• Better equipment. A smaller and smaller percentage of false alarms is attributed to technological problems, and new technology and different approaches to alarm system manufacturing and design are further reducing the prevalence of equipment-caused false alarms. Other measures and features that are believed to reduce false alarms include
  • sensors with greater dependability
  • duplication of certain types of sensors (such as motion detectors)
  • alarm panels that require several sensors to trip before transmitting an alarm
  • alarm panels that accept cancel codes so that users acting quickly can cancel their own false alarms
  Conversely, the elimination of some sophisticated alarm system features has been encouraged on the grounds that they cause false alarms at a rate grossly disproportionate to any proven usefulness of those features. For example, "1+" duress coding--whereby a user whom a burglar has ordered to turn off the alarm system sends a silent alarm by keying in a code one number higher than the regular passcode--is said to have been used successfully almost never. What usually happens is that users enter the duress code accidentally, missing their correct code by just one digit. Fatigue, hurry, long fingernails, and wide fingers are to blame.
  One suggestion regarding alarm system options is that manufacturers should preset the options to the settings that cause the fewest false alarms. If a particular customer desires a more sophisticated or more sensitive feature, he or she can ask the installer to change the equipment as needed.
  Another area of technological improvement is dispatch--the communication between central station and police department. Goals include the quick transfer of more detailed information to police (such as which alarms in a building have activated) and suitably secure means of canceling police dispatches. Options under consideration include secure fax machines and direct computer hookups between alarm companies and police departments. One protocol that enables central stations and police dispatchers to communicate via computer is called SANTA (Standardized Alarm Notification Transmission Alternative). SANTA is managed by the Municipal Response Management Corporation, a subsidiary of CSAA, and is currently being used in Minneapolis.

Measuring success in false alarm reduction isn't a simple matter of numbers. If the number of false alarms in a city declines, does that mean the alarm systems are still protecting homes and businesses but sending fewer false alarms? Or does it mean users are so afraid of false alarm fines that they leave their systems off when they should be on or even turn their systems off permanently? Or does it mean sensors have been turned down to such low sensitivity levels that they miss legitimate events? Or does it mean alarm users have switched to private alarm responders, and is that what the police department wants? If the number of false alarms rises, could that be due to an increase in the number of alarm systems? Or an increase in attempted burglaries that appear to be false alarms?

Some people want to reduce false alarms to 0.2 per system per year; others are shooting for zero. Still others note that if alarms ever succeed completely in deterring burglary, every alarm will be a false one, and that will be a happy end.

Major national-level efforts to reduce false alarms include the NBFAA Fast Start Program; a series of false alarm training courses developed by the Alarm Industry Research and Educational Foundation (AIREF) and implemented by NBFAA; and several efforts by CSAA.

The Fast Start Program is an eight-step program that aims "to help reduce false and unnecessary police alarm dispatches by 50% nationwide in one year." A one-page synopsis of the steps, along with contact information, can be found in the appendix.

The AIREF/NBFAA training series is being tested in Dallas and will spread around the country. The first workshop of the series provides an overview of false alarm prevention and will be presented to police departments, alarm dealers, neighborhood associations, chambers of commerce, and other interested parties. Subsequent workshops will separately target alarm users, alarm installers, central station dispatchers, alarm salespeople, and police departments.

Over the last two years CSAA has made much progress in determining the technical and human sources of false alarms. It has created standards for central station operators and has asked all its members nationwide to participate in an ongoing, monthly false alarm report and evaluation. The report will be able to quantify the effects of false alarm reduction efforts on a national basis. CSAA has also brought together manufacturers of alarm hardware and software and elicited their participation in efforts to fix technical problem areas.

Frustration with false alarms drives some governments and police departments to act unilaterally to escape the burden of excessive false alarm response. They threaten to or actually do suspend all police response to alarms, or they enact ordinances that impose draconian penalties and restrictions on alarm users and alarm companies.

However, since false alarms are caused by--and can be prevented by--so many different parties, it makes sense to involve everyone in the solution. A "solution" imposed from above can enforce no more than a few of the false alarm reduction measures listed in this chapter. A true solution, however, will probably require the simultaneous use of many measures by many people working in concert.