Phone Watch and Joe duffy

Evolution1

A lot of angry PW customers since Joe Duffy decided to announce to Ireland how phonewatch alarms are bypassed.

Was he right to do this ? Maybe it will educate people to look into the systems they are buying.

There has also been an increase to the number of houses with a phonewatch alarm being targeted.

altor

Evolution1 wrote: »

A lot of angry PW customers since Joe Duffy decided to announce to Ireland how phonewatch alarms are bypassed.

Was he right to do this ? Maybe it will educate people to look into the systems they are buying.

There has also been an increase to the number of houses with a phonewatch alarm being targeted.

Boards is not the place to discus this, national radio should not of being the place either.
Its up to P.W. to make there customers aware of the issues.

KoolKid

Highlighting such an obvious vulnerability that we all know about can be a good thing. There are plenty of things more that could be highlighted. A lot of problems in this industry come from companies using a one system fits all approach as well as being more motivated by sales rather than the security needs of the application.

kub

Phonewatch would be better off now portraying themselves as a security company rather than a marketing company.

KoolKid I agree one size does not fit all.

Evolution1

So should PW customers go out and buy blank bellbox lids so no one will know what type of system they have ?

KoolKid

Evolution1 wrote: »

So should PW customers go out and buy blank bellbox lids so no one will know what type of system they have ?

Mod edit. Please keep negative comments about your competitions training methods off boards.

kub

Mod edit, removed quoted text

Stoner

OK guys two things

1) phone watch is your competition, and needs to be treated in the same way as any other system installer here, same rules that protect you apply to them.

2) Regardless if a vulnerability is reported on the radio, that's up to RTE. Most systems are not perfect so let's not repeat anything that can help a burglar here.

lgk

Evolution1 wrote: »

Was he right to do this ? Maybe it will educate people to look into the systems they are buying.

Was he right? I think so. You can be sure word was spreading among the criminal fraternity, the public should be informed, and it's clear PhoneWatch weren't doing this. The same thing is happening in the IT industry, with some software vendors complaining about vulnerabilities in their products being publicised despite them being given ample time to remedy the issue in advance. They're too caught up selling more product than they are interested in looking after the interests of their current customers.

Likewise PW are only interested in selling systems/ monitoring. They have no interest in tailoring a solution to meet the needs of their customers.

I have no involvement in the security industry, and my only involvement with PW, was that they hassled and fooled my elderly parents into signing up for their system last year, despite the fact that they had gotten a more comprehensive system installed ~8 months previously. The system they installed had no perimeter protection like the previous system had, and was installed in such a way that they had to disable/re-enable every time they went to that bathroom during the night. Being elderly, that's not a seldom use case. Took me a while, but after threats of legal action, they eventually admitted it wasn't fit for purpose, had been mis-sold and took it out and refunded my parents.

KoolKid

Mod Edit:

This is exactly the sort of response that kicks things off again. Please stop.
Altor don't thank this please. I'm in no mood for that either.

PeteK*

Are we allowed to ask if it's the wired, wireless or their new smart one?

kub

Ok I may be a competitor but i will answer the previous post. Having listened to The Joe Duffy Show and most especially to the callers, they were all wireless systems.

Evolution1

PeteK* wrote: »

Are we allowed to ask if it's the wired, wireless or their new smart one?

The "smart alarm" is wireless.
being wireless isn't the flaw with those alarms. Its that those systems aren't suppose to be used unless connected to a cloud server which protects them from smash and crash. They were designed to be installed quickly and have loads of features such as home automation etc. The Flaw is with Phone watch and how they went about installing these systems. You can't hack away the brains of the system and expect it to work.

PeteK*

kub wrote: »

Ok I may be a competitor but i will answer the previous post. Having listened to The Joe Duffy Show and most especially to the callers, they were all wireless systems.

Okay, thanks.

Evolution1 wrote: »

The "smart alarm" is wireless.
being wireless isn't the flaw with those alarms. Its that those systems aren't suppose to be used unless connected to a cloud server which protects them from smash and crash. They were designed to be installed quickly and have loads of features such as home automation etc. The Flaw is with Phone watch and how they went about installing these systems. You can't hack away the brains of the system and expect it to work.

Yeah, but I meant their older wireless one and not their 'smart alarm' one.
Are PhoneWatch making changes for their customers or anything?

There was talk of two relatives getting their new smart one. With another having wired and the other having wireless.. but both have CCTV, too. But not connected to the alarms at all.

kub

Well done for coming on here enquiring, I would advise you to get at least 3 written quotation from PSA licensed companies. There seems to be a myth out there, possibly due to marketing that only PW monitor alarm systems, this is simply not true.

It is always more secure to have the means of operating the alarm ie. The keypad, fitted in a different place than the actual control panel.