Video Verification Explained: How It Changes Alarm Response

The problem video verification solves

The overwhelming majority of burglar alarm activations are false. Los Angeles reports that over 90 percent of its 6,000 to 7,000 monthly alarm calls are false, and San Antonio puts the figure at 91 percent of burglar alarms. Police departments know this, which is why a bare "alarm activation" call has historically drawn low dispatch priority, and why some jurisdictions now require some form of verification before rolling a unit at all. Ring's monitoring documentation states this directly: "In some areas, police and fire departments require that certain security system signals are verified before emergency responders can be dispatched."

Seattle is a concrete example. The city tells alarm companies that since October 1, 2024 Seattle police will only dispatch to alarm calls with supporting evidence such as audio, video, a panic alarm, or eyewitness evidence that someone is illegally entering a property, and will no longer respond to sensor or motion activations alone.

Video verification attacks the problem at its root. If a camera can show a person inside the home during the alarm, the call to dispatch is no longer "an alarm went off" but "an alarm went off and we can see someone." That distinction is what the industry has now standardized.

AVS-01: the standard behind verified response

The Monitoring Association (TMA), the industry body for monitoring centers, published the ANSI/TMA AVS-01 Alarm Validation Scoring standard to give every alarm call a repeatable score that estimates "the validity or potential threat level of a burglar alarm activation using historical and real-time data." The levels, per TMA:

Video (along with audio and other real-time data) is the main way a monitoring operator moves an alarm from Level 1, the traditional unverified alarm, up to Levels 2 through 4. TMA states the score now travels with the call for service to emergency communications centers to assist with prioritization, and the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) has ratified a resolution supporting the standard.

Who actually runs certified centers matters for buyers. TMA's page for the standard, last updated in July 2026, lists nine certified AVS-01 monitoring centers: ADT, Affiliated Monitoring, Brinks Home, Federal Response Center, Guardian Protection, National Monitoring Center, Rapid Response Monitoring Services, SimpliSafe, and Vector Security. Some brands you buy from outsource monitoring to a center on that list, so ask who actually operates the center behind the system you are quoted.

What video verification looks like in practice

Provider implementations differ in who watches the video.

ADT's Alarm Messenger with Video Verification sends the alarm event and a camera clip (from designated Google Nest cameras, when the customer has chosen to share video with ADT) to the primary contact's phone. You can review the clip and either cancel the alarm or request police from the chat session; if you request police or do not cancel, the clip is shared with an ADT agent, who "then notifies emergency responders of the alarm, noting that the alarm is video verified." A Request Police action takes priority over any cancel action, and the session gives participants roughly 80 seconds to act before the alarm goes to an agent for the normal call-to-verify procedure.

SimpliSafe's Active Guard Outdoor Protection (on its Pro and Pro Plus plans) has monitoring agents watch outdoor camera feeds during alarms and observed events. For reported violence, burglary, fire, or medical emergency, agents immediately request emergency services and then call the primary contact; for suspicious activity they contact you first.

Ring offers Guard Response, which sends a guard to verify an emergency in person, a model built for jurisdictions with verified-response ordinances where police will not respond to unverified signals.

The common thread: verification either adds evidence to the dispatch call or replaces the police visit entirely for unverified events. Both outcomes reduce your exposure to false alarm fines, since fines are charged when police respond to nothing.

Is video verification worth choosing a plan for?

If you are already paying for professional monitoring, verification capability is one of the few genuine differentiators between plans that otherwise look identical on paper. The decision logic:

It matters most where police response policy is strict. If your city has a verified response ordinance or heavy false alarm fines, a verified alarm is the difference between a response and a report number. Check your city's alarm ordinance alongside your provider choice.

It requires cameras in the right places. Video verification only works if a camera covers the likely entry points, and, per ADT's documentation, only if you have opted in to sharing video with the monitoring center. A verified plan with no interior or entry-facing cameras verifies nothing.

It is a monitoring feature, not a hardware feature. The same cameras behave differently under different plans; what you are buying is the monitoring center's authority and process to look and escalate. That is part of the broader case examined in is professional monitoring worth it.

If verified response matters to you, ask providers directly whether their monitoring center is AVS-01 certified and how their video verification flow works. Our questionnaire at /quote fetches quotes from professional monitoring providers, and it is reasonable to make verification capability one of your selection criteria when comparing them. For the fee side of the comparison, see home security cost per month.