Home Security and Smart Home
LMSC I have a Mac mini running Indigo software controlling z-wave lights, texecom alarm, Heatmiser heating, Spirit TRVs, Sonos, Virgin, denon amp, selection of TVs, irrigation. Via connection to Hubitat it controls Zigbee light bulbs and remote controls. All devices are controlled by Alexa from Indigo, and then I run homekitbridge on the Mac which publishes all those devices and cameras to HomeKit.
I think that’s it… sure there are bits I am forgetting.
Unifi USG and multiple wifi APs. Pi holes on pis and QNAP NAS.
oh and the Harry Potter magic map that shows live location of keys and phones on a floor plan of the house!
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simonc Awesome. That’s almost everything we could think of except curtains and blinds.
I do like the simplicity of hardwares like Z Wave.
@hornbyben - We will decide after speaking to Laxone consultant. We are struggling with dates for the visit.
Elsewhere, I have got 3 quotes to replace all windows and doors. All are recommended by a builder who did our kitchen a few years back. The doors are from endurance. The windows are standard triple glazed UPVC frames matching building control / planning requirements. The planning said we don’t need an approval as long as the installers match the appearance , building control and issue FENSA.
Velfac / Rational costs for all windows and doors may double or triple the cost.
Velfac approved installer said they won’t do anything other than new dwellings. Rational - we haven’t contacted them yet.
We remember one of the local companies telling us they can’t match the external appearance, if aluminium coated frames as they are limited by colour choices.
What is the take on home assistant or Open Hab, if we find Laxone is very expensive? Thx
Interesting thread …. which I seem to have missed.
My take, which I’m not necessarily suggesting suits anybody else, is to consider security and home automation as not necessarily linked.
For me, home automation is about our convenience. And nowt else. Part of that is what data I am prepared to let leak to the likes of Amazon (not too much) or Google (absolutely nothing if I can prevent it without massive inconvenience). So, I have a few Echo devices and some smart bulbs that let me turn lights on/off or dim, by voice (or switch/sensor, as well, in a couple of cases), and play internet radio. Not much else, and no way am I connecting cameras to that.
Security is a different issue (for me) and I approach that with two different philosophies. Those are ‘obvious’ and ‘non-obvious’. Non-obvious involves some physical measures that are going to make getting in non-trivial. The obvious category is things that anyone walking/driving past might see, like alarm boxes, cameras or gates, walls, etc.
The other factor is to consider who are are seeking to protect from. The meaures I would take against the casual local ne’er-do-well opportunistic a-hole are very different from what might work against a professional. For the latter, well, unless you’re setting up Fort Knox, the White House or Buckingham Palace (and at least two of those have had well-publicised breaches) it’s a case of not keeping out really serious burglars unless you’re spending mega-money.
All you can do is either make it hard enough that hopefully they target someone else, or minimise the risk profile by not having anything to target that would make it worth their while in the first place. Or, potentially, by being crafty enough to appear to not have nothing worth their effort, and hiding it really cleverly if they try anyway.
But be aware, there is (in my opinion) a very bad middle ground. I’d advise against taking suffiiently expensive preventative measures to keep the casual local idiots out, by going far enough to hang out a sign to the serious burglars saying “something here worth nicking”.
So …. take all obvious basic steps - decent doors/windows, don’t leave ground floor doors unlocked and secure windows etc if you go out, chain any ladders etc down, or better yet, don’t leave anything like that laying around in the first place. That’s a set of examples, not a comprehensive list. Oh, and basic alarm boxes etc might deter the casual thief but too good a system risks advertising yourself to a more serious class of scumbag.
You might even want to consider the alarm box you appear to have not being the one you actually do. Oh, and hard-wired is better, IMHO, than wifi for security functions. Other measures might include anti-climb paint, nasty bushes (with nasty needles ;) ) along fence lines to deter people climbing over, etc. Oh, and be aware of what you can do legally, and what you can’t - broken glass on the tops of walls for fences isn’t a bright idea, but a few bushes with loads of 2″ thorns or needles …. <grin>.
Less obvious? Think about how you might get in if you had to break in? Where are the less secure points? Garage door is often one. You can also consider re-inforced door frames, and wood-clad steel-cored doors, etc. These aren’t that cheap, and even less so as a retrofit, but if done well, will be invisible from the outside. Good luck to anyone trying to kick my doors in …. when they get out of the foot/ankle plaster. ;)
That kind of measure is effective against casuals, without screaming “something to protect” to professionals.
Another factor, and it’s a major one …. the size, type and location of where you live. Living in a Beverly Hills mansion is going to present a different risk profile to a council house in Stoke on Trent, Deptford or well, anywhere really. That will be part of assessing who you are protecting against.
Finally, consider exactly what you are protecting, what it is worth, and what both the cost and inconvenience factors of serious security are against the value of what you’re protecting, and/or where a more sensible approach is either to not hve extremely valuable items in the first place, or to ensure you insure them thoroughly.
One reason I don’t have an extensive collection of Monet’s and Van Gogh’s is I can’t protect them. So it’s convenient I also can’t afford them. I can afford nice watches, jewelry, etc but chose not to have them, partly for security reasons. Also because while I like watches, I don’t like them enough to pay what a collection would cost. And the one I do have …. insured.
I don’t want to live in a secure bunker, partly because of the inconvenience. I also don’t want the worry of loads of expensive and highly portable stuff. Sure, some stuff is expensive (though not in Picasso territory, or anything close) but some camera gear, computer gear etc is worth a fair bit. So, I have good insurance and if the worst happens, it can all be easily replaced.
I take reasonable steps to deter casual riff-raff, plus some “non-obvious” measures, but don’t have anything likely to attract serious professionals, and not much to attract even less serious ones …. that isn’t insured thoroughly.
We each have to calibrate our response to security according to our circumstances, what we’re trying to protect, who we’re protecting against and how much cost and inconvience taking more measure would involve, and whether it’s worth it or not. It is easy to get carried away with what you can do rather than what really makes sense to do, and to omit considering that more heavyweight measures might actually have a downside, in marking you as a target.
All IMHO, and YMMV.
5 simple things can make a house/garden less interesting compared to a neighbour’s house and cost little to nothing.
- Beware of the dog signs
- If you have a garage, use it a lot for the car (then it’s not always clear when you are in or out)
- Unless you are using a downstairs room at that moment, keep the curtains closed (Kitchen and Utility don’t count). Saves energy too.
- Turn on LBC, Talk Radio in the kitchen, or similar when you go out. Burglars like it when you’re not home), so don’t let them know you’re not there. There are also deterrent sound, but they don’t work as well
- Lights on routines. (linked to sunset sunrise)
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Putting smart devices on cloud is no. It should stay local, subject to secured access if away from home is required. This is straight forward.
We can never protect us from determined hackers or professional theivea.
We all use our garage as a storage, is it not? Like all British homes, our garage is packed. 😁
Playing a radio or a TV is an interesting idea. It needs to be done remotely to make it effective. Otherwise, it will run 24 × 7!
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LMSC Playing a radio or a TV is an interesting idea. It needs to be done remotely to make it effective. Otherwise, it will run 24 × 7!
Simply put it on a schedule or a routine you run when you go out. When I leave the house, on goes a Talk radio channel (Alexa Device). If that deters a burglar, it’s worth it. When Going away, it doesn’t hurt to ask your neighbour to park on your drive, if your car isn’t going to be there for days/weeks.
It’s important to make people unsure if anyone is at home.
P.S. It might even be possible to fire up the Alexa if there is activity detected by the doorbell…I might try that one.
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I have no objection to putting some smart devices on internet access, and some (like Alexa) won’t work without internet access. This, I grant, is a trade-off between security/privacy on the one hand, and veratility and convenience on the other. I’m prepared to give up a bit of security/privacy for that functionality. So, given that I use them for internet radio, it’s hard to avoid having them on the ’net. I have no problems with certain light switches, too. Anythng with a camera, or security implications, not a chance.
I have some IFTTT-type routines for my absence, controlling lights and scheduled noises, like radio BUT …. one weakness of that approach is that no net connection = no Alexa. So, I also have some lights and a radio on semi-randomising standalone switches.
Note - I said last post that I didn’t recommend what I do as necessarily suitable for others. In part, that was about the privacy compromise, and in part it was because of how I go about it. One, but by no means the only, aspect of that is VLANs, MAC-filtering and two internet connections keeping smart home devices OFF my fairly carefully secured primary network. It also gives me redundancy if my main net connection goes down, and if I’m away and not using the primary network, it gives redundancy to the security aspects.
But how far to go? That is the question. Redundancy on net connections is one thing, but none of it helps if household power goes down, and putting in generators to stop risk that is, for me, way overkill.
The whole game is, in my view, a bit like backing up your computer - it’s a balance between cost and convenience, versus degree of protection. I know if I don’t take it reasonably seriously it’ll bite me in the butt, and the question is when, not if. But at the same time, I’m not wanting to go overboard about it.
CoffeePhilE As you state about loosing power. I live in a New build so Electric and Gas isolation is outside, very easy to cut the power off by any unwelcoming visitors. So just another thing to take into account on what you instal.
LMSC I like Eufy because you can keep it all local. Yes, there are downsides, but no recording to a cloud that needs a monthly subscription.
I only use the onboard SD card at the moment 2 internal (one in shed, one in kitchen) and one floodlight in garden. Will get a NAS at some point and record to that.
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CoffeePhilE You have driven home some valid points; local vs internet based access is a trade-off, which we can minimise the risk by going the VPN route for an example. Similarly, I agree with the VLAN for IoT devices coupled, MAC access control, realising RAID 1 isn’t a back up, keeping a back up copies, etc are sensible approaches.
Meldrew Nothing can be done, if they do that. A BackUPS to safely shut down the systems - NAS, firewall, locally managed hardware for smart devices, etc is a good strategy.
PortafilterProcrastinator Eufy appears popular. We also want to have a flexibility to connect it HomeKit. Some of their external devices can’t connect even with bridge. You don’t to offload your CCTV on cloud.
Really, appreciate every one chipping in. It is an interesting thread for anyone looking into this space. Perhaps, Dave might make it a sticky thread so that people can find it easily.
LMSC Really, appreciate every one chipping in. It is an interesting thread for anyone looking into this space. Perhaps, Dave might make it a sticky thread so that people can find it easily.
Every time I do a sticky it ends up permanently at the top of the discussion main landing thread….I’ve actually been unstickying thread s for a while when ages ago I logged in with my test account and saw 20 stickies on the landing page, when I thought they would only be in the area I put them in.
Unfortunately all the flarum users seem to be happy with the way it works and don’t see why a forum would need area specific stickies…
It’s really any stored data about an individual, which is why I store the minimum. There are all sorts of happy birthday add-ons to things and I hate those, can you imagine it announces on an open forum that it’s your Birthday…you post somewhere forgetfully your true age on the forum and bingo, they got your exact date of birth. Assuming you input your birthday correctly in the first place.
https://coffeetime.freeflarum.com/d/179-what-information-do-we-hold-about-you