4 Home Security Myths Debunked

Most home­own­ers will agree about the impor­tance of home secu­ri­ty for pre­vent­ing crimes such as bur­glary and home inva­sion. How­ev­er, not every­body approach­es their home secu­ri­ty in the same way.

Unfor­tu­nate­ly, many peo­ple have false notions about what will pro­tect them based on myths that have been long debunked. At PROTECTION PLUS, we have seen these myths con­tin­ue to recir­cu­late for decades. And no mat­ter how often they’re debunked, they return.

In this post, we dis­pel 4 of the most com­mon myths to explain why they’re inef­fec­tive (and which secu­ri­ty mea­sures work instead).

Myth #1: Your dog will protect you.

There’s some par­tial truth to this myth: a bark­ing dog may indeed deter some intrud­ers. But how do you know your dog will bark at all? Can you guar­an­tee your dog will hear an intrud­er who enters through the base­ment or anoth­er part of your home? Addi­tion­al­ly, do you want to place the safe­ty and well-being of your fam­i­ly entire­ly in the “hands” of your pet?

Final­ly, don’t make the mis­take of assum­ing your dog will pro­tect you from a vio­lent crim­i­nal. You can’t pre­dict what will hap­pen when an intrud­er is armed and dan­ger­ous. That’s why it’s impor­tant to have a mon­i­tored home secu­ri­ty sys­tem that alerts you (and the mon­i­tor­ing cen­ter dis­patch­ers) to the first sign of dan­ger.

Myth #2: Burglars only strike at night.

This is not true. 80% of break-ins occur dur­ing day­light hours, accord­ing to fig­ures from insur­ance experts at SGI Cana­da. So if you’re only lock­ing your doors and win­dows at night, you’re leav­ing your­self at risk.

Bur­glars tar­get homes that look unoc­cu­pied dur­ing the day when res­i­dents are at work, school or on vaca­tion. This gives them much bet­ter vis­i­bil­i­ty when enter­ing a home. Plus, it enables them to use numer­ous lies to explain their sus­pi­cious behav­iour if some­one ques­tions them.

Be sure to keep your home ful­ly secured dur­ing the day. Con­sid­er installing an alarm sys­tem with secu­ri­ty cam­eras to deter bur­glars and alert you to any activ­i­ty at your home.

Myth #3: Nice neighbourhoods have less crime.

Don’t con­flate low crime rates with low risk. You may live in a desir­able area with low­er crime rates than oth­er neigh­bour­hoods. But that doesn’t mean your home won’t be the next tar­get.

One rea­son why this myth is so dan­ger­ous is that it cre­ates a false sense of secu­ri­ty. Home­own­ers who assume “it won’t hap­pen here” become lax­er about their secu­ri­ty, leav­ing their doors unlocked and win­dows open. But that’s exact­ly what crim­i­nals are look­ing for.

All it takes is one of those secu­ri­ty mis­steps for an intrud­er to exploit and gain access to your home. This is why every home­own­er needs to be vig­i­lant about their home secu­ri­ty, regard­less of their local crime rates.

Myth #4: If my alarm system is triggered, the police will come automatically.

Not always. Police in Toron­to and sur­round­ing juris­dic­tions require ver­i­fy­ing alarms before respond­ing. This is why it’s impor­tant to install a sys­tem with secu­ri­ty cam­eras that can be used to con­firm a crime in progress so that police response is pri­or­i­tized.

With ALARM‑i, for exam­ple, Visu­al Alarm Ver­i­fi­ca­tion is built into the sys­tem. Every alarm event is cap­tured on cam­era so dis­patch­ers can quick­ly alert the author­i­ties (with footage to ver­i­fy the crime).

Is your home security adequate?

Don’t leave your home secu­ri­ty to guess­work. Request a no-oblig­a­tion secu­ri­ty audit from PROTECTION PLUS to deter­mine if your home has vul­ner­a­bil­i­ties that must be addressed.