Security cameras have become commonplace in and around homes, as people use them to keep tabs on their property and help police solve crimes.
But selecting the right camera system, setting it up correctly and maintaining the cameras is critical for them to be effective.
“It’s a very efficient way of investigating crimes,” said Maj. James Curry with the Fairfax County Police Department’s Criminal Investigations Division.
With Black Friday and Cyber Monday around the corner, one popular buy is camera systems. Curry said it’s important to choose the right system for your home.
Many cameras send video wirelessly through hubs or the internet, but for outdoor cameras, you’ll need to decide whether you want battery-powered cameras or cameras wired to power.
“In these critical moments, if we have the ability to reach out to as many people as possible, look through your surveillance footage, tell us what you saw, it puts us on the right track,” he said.
For wired cameras, getting electricity to them safely may require an electrician, though some companies offer floodlight replacements or power-over-ethernet options that use a single cable for both power and video.
Other decisions include whether you want a system that saves video locally or to pay a monthly fee for cloud storage.
“Night vision is huge. The storage you can go through hard wired, or you can certainly look at cloud storages. There’s so many different opportunities,” Curry said.
Curry stressed that saving video is key and recommended factoring in subscription costs.
“Some of the things that we often see is people put a lot of time and effort into purchasing these cameras, but then don’t pay for any subscriptions for the surveillance footage, whether it’s cloud-based or elsewhere,” he said.
Once a system is chosen, placement is critical. Curry suggested walking around your home and thinking like a criminal.
“Take a full 360 around the house,” Curry said. “We want to look for the blind spots. We want to cover the entryways. We want to consider the windows and certainly your backyards.”
He advised against placing cameras behind glass because reflections can ruin the image.
“Unfortunately, if you have a light source outside, it’s going to interfere … with the window and that camera,” he said.
Mount cameras high enough to prevent tampering. And if you choose battery-powered cameras, maintenance is key.
“The biggest thing we run into is the battery issue. A lot of folks forget to replace their batteries, and their cameras are dead,” Curry said. “So they’re pretty much useless.”
Curry also recommended keeping neighbors’ privacy in mind and talking with them about placement concerns.
“We always have to make sure that we’re keeping in mind our own privacy,” he said.
Many cameras come with detection features that can alert you to people or even sounds. Curry said those can be helpful for security.
In Fairfax County, residents can register their cameras with police, so detectives can reach out if a crime or missing person’s case happens nearby. Doing so does not give the department live access to your cameras.
“This is simply letting us know that this exists in the community. We can reach out to you, and rather than having a detective or an officer knock on your door, we can just do things more efficiently and hopefully help solve whatever crime that might be, or help find whatever missing person you might be looking for,” he said.
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