South Florida Sun-Sentinel Palm Beach (Sunday)
Stop package theft with these devices
As deliveries begin to roll in ahead of the holiday season, it’s prime time for porch pirates to swipe unprotected packages off of doorsteps. A number of strategies can foil their evil plans, and bringing a few smart home gadgets into play is high on the list.
Americans are estimated to spend
$63 billion online for holiday shopping this season. But package theft could cost shoppers and retailers significant time and money. However, you can take some measures to ensure the safety of your packages. The proliferation of smart home devices means you can monitor deliveries from your phone. Here are three great security devices that will help ensure that your packages get to you.
Arlo Video Doorbell
Connected buzzers work in much the same way as traditional security cameras. The hardwired Arlo Video Doorbell has high-definition resolution, a live video feed, motion alerts and more — for a super reasonable price. Subscribe to the Arlo Smart cloud service for access to advanced motion alerts that differentiate between people, animals, cars and packages. You can also look back at your video footage with Arlo Smart to help neighbors and law enforcement (if necessary) identify who snagged your holiday deliveries.
Arlo Pro 4
The Arlo Pro 4 is smart and feature-rich, with 2K video resolution, a built-in spotlight for nighttime deterrence, a surprisingly loud siren and all the smarts of the company’s video doorbell. With a subscription, you can look back at recorded events, get alerts and use two-way talk to scare off would-be porch pirates.
Ring Mailbox Sensor
Ring’s Mailbox Sensor is a device specifically for tracking when people are opening your mailbox, which makes tracking deliveries a lot easier. But if you have a home security system at home, another easy way of monitoring your mailbox is using a door/window sensor — one of those magnetic gadgets that pings the system when an entryway is opened — inside the door of your box. Either way you do it, you should be able to track the delivery of small parcels — and make sure you know when someone’s opening the mailbox who shouldn’t be.
For more reviews of personal technology products, visit www.cnet.com.