
Originally Posted by
bigb
I know nothing about this Iris system, but the idea of receiving an email or text about an alarm is a good one. I know somebody who used to work at Control4 here in Utah. Since he was a salesman there, he got all the equipment on the cheap. He had it set up to where he could control everything in his house from his iphone. He could do lighting, sound system, heating/cooling, etc. all remotely. He didn't even have to be in the state. He said that one day while they were on vacation, he got an email saying that his garage door had just gone up. Rather than call the cops, he called his sister (who lived a few blocks away). She confirmed it was her. By not having an alarm company automatically call the cops, it saved all that mess of a false alarm.
In the time it would take to call a neighbor before calling the cops, there's not much more that a burglar could do that he couldn't do without that extra minute.