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Found a stat about false alarms that shook me up
I was reading through our city's police department annual report and saw that 94% of alarm calls in our area last year were false. That means only 6 out of every 100 calls were real. Does that make us look bad or is this just the norm across the industry?
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marywells7d ago
Man, that stat is wild. 94% false? I used to think most alarm calls were probably real, but seeing that number just flipped my whole view. It makes you wonder how much time and money gets wasted on all those false alarms when real emergencies might be waiting. Honestly, it doesn't make the city look bad, it just sounds like the norm for any place with a lot of home security systems.
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the_miles7d ago
Actually, that 94% number is from a 2019 study by the Electronic Security Association, but it's been around for a while. The real issue is that most false alarms come from user error, not equipment failure. People forget to disarm their systems, or they set them off by accident. I remember reading a report from the city of Los Angeles that said about 80% of their false alarms were from residential systems being triggered by things like pets or leaving a door open. So the stat isn't that every city has the same problem, it's that the problem is mostly about people not being careful. Ngl, it's frustrating for police departments because they have to respond to every alarm, even if 9 out of 10 times it's nothing.
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