Verizon is leveraging new Wi-Fi tech to help with controlling and securing home environments both physically and digitally. Two new apps, Home Awareness and Device ID, are offered to Fios customers at no additional charge.
Home Awareness uses patented sensing technology from Origin Wireless, which is a Verizon Ventures portfolio company. It enables some Fios router models to detect unexpected motion in the home by detecting disruptions in Wi-Fi signals. It in effect acts as a motion detector for your home.
Subscribers are alerted through the My Fios App. The app will offer a live dashboard and historical views of unexpected motion. Verizon and Origin Wireless will add features on an ongoing basis, according to Verizon.
“We’re bringing to market a technology that will help customers better understand their home without the need for cameras or sensors,” Pavan Challa, Verizon’s Director of Product Management, said in a press release. “We’re excited to partner with Origin Wireless on this new state-of-the-art technology that gives Verizon customers even more value for their money,” Challa said.
The other new service, Device ID, was developed with SAM Seamless Network, which also is a Verizon Ventures portfolio company. The service monitors home networks for new or previously unrecognized devices.
The added insight of Device ID enables control of home networks and connected devices. It is available to all customers on eligible Fios routers.
Verizon efforts to address home monitoring and security also includes a partnership with SimpliSafe for a more traditional home security platform. In May, the company began to offer SimpliSafe for free to new Verizon 5G Internet and Fios customers.
At the time, Verizon said a five-piece home security system that includes high definition indoor home cameras, two entry sensors, a keypad, a base station and a month of free professional monitoring would be available to new subscribers to the Fios Gigabit service. The company valued the package at more than $400.
