EscARC/to add

escARC

ESCTL Alarm Receiving Centre

Thoughts on how it works

Already done

• Texecom alarm units fitted with ComIP modules
• Configured to alert to central monitoring station via ContactID protocol
• Central monitoring station on private network across DMVPN (Dedicated subnet)
• Alerts received at ARC are logged into MySQL database
• Database needs to be pre-configured for each location with mapping of zone/area number to text description (ContactID just sends numeric values)

To do

• Populate DB with contact details for keyholders, local police etc. for each location
• Suggested workflow:
  • Alarm event received
  • ARC alerts all members of the alarm's "monitoring users" group(s) via their preferences of
    • SMS
    • Voice call (Asterisk dialout)
    • Email
    • Facebook Messenger
  • Alert contains a web link e.g. esctl.co.uk/arc/?h=abc7fhf
    • Hash intended to be generated and stored in DB; should represent user ID and alarm being responded to
    • Intention is that no further authentication should be needed (it's easy/quick to click on)
  • First person to respond
    • Message displaying saying "You're the first, please click here to acknowledge you are responding"
      • should this be the default action, and you need to click to un-acknowledge? Some timing issues with that, though.
      • Database is then updated to say "X is dealing with this"
  • Further people to respond
    • Message displayed to say "X is dealing with this"
  • All users then shown details of the alert, and contact details for the location, e.g.
    • Alert
      • Area: Garage
      • Sensor: Side window
    • Contact
      • 1: Phone by front door: 0161 660 1234
      • 2: Jonathan 07123 456 789
      • 3: Neighbour (Malcolm) 0161 962 7890
    • Police
      • GMP 0161 872 5050
  • Once it has been established that everything is OK, the DB will be updated and everybody notified via the same channels as previously, that the event has been closed down
  • As a separate note we should agree duress code-words for use on the phone, e.g. "Tell Sam everything is OK" means quite the opposite