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3 Online And Physical Security Options For SMBs

Security is important to most retail store owners, but increasingly important to home-based small businesses, too. We spend a significant amount of money for computers and gadgets and we want to protect them.

With these three surveillance and security applications, you can monitor your home office or almost any location quickly, easily, and affordably. These are mostly indoor cameras, but with a little ingenuity you can mount one to capture outdoor areas or buy a special case to protect it from the elements and harm.

1. Sensr

This is a new player in the home surveillance and security market. Their approach is disruptive, which often means free. (They promise to maintain a free plan.) Their system works with a lot of cameras (read more here in the FAQ) because they have special computer vision code running at Sensr that can generate motion alerts and that’s how they monitor for you. The camera has to support FTP (file transfer protocol) but most networked cameras do. There are premium level plans in the works, but you can test it out easily. You will want to read the FAQ for details on which camera to buy and how you can enable private versus public access. For example, you can share your video stream with your friends on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.

2. Dropcam

Dropcam is fairly amazing. You don’t need a computer to make its cameras work—you just plug them in and they connect to the Internet via your WiFi connection. They promise it will only take two minutes and I guess that’s if you have to struggle to find an outlet. You can tap into it and watch through your iPhone or Android phone as well. The cameras have motion and audio detection capabilities so you can receive an e-mail alert whenever something moves or makes noise within range of your Dropcam camera. Service plans start at $8.95/mo and that includes seven days of stored digital video recording. Cameras start at $199.

3. LogitechAlert (tm) 750i

Logitech is known for its webcams and this new high-definition video security system is pretty impressive for the small business that wants to monitor a location. You purchase the camera and software starting at $299 and the Web, iPad, or smartphone access is free. The camera itself has a two gigabyte SD card for recording about a week’s worth of video (less if audio is enabled), but you could buy a larger memory card.

If you’ve left your home office or business location unsecured, now is the time to test out one of these solutions. Each one is less than what you would have to pay to replace to replace the computer or gadget if it was stolen. It may not be as robust as a full security service that immediately calls the police, however, you can get a text message pretty fast or let one of these update your family and friends on a social network.

Tags: Security, Security Options