For a rule of thumb, If you can tell it's fake, then an
intruder will be able to tell it's fake. Take for instance
the sample camera to the left. If you haven't already
realized, it is quite obviously fake. There are several ways
to tell if a security camera is fake. The first thing to
point out is the housing, it is made of cheap plastic. The
second and most obvious is the red light on the front of the
camera. What is that thing supposed to do anyway? It might
be popular in movies, but real security cameras don't have a
red light. Its a dead giveaway that the camera is a fake, it
wouldn't be any easier to spot if the word FAKE was written
all over it. Some dummy cameras are even motion-activated
which is silly, an intruder could easily test to see if the
camera moves randomly or if it's motion activated. It may
fool a child, but it wont fool an experienced thief. Its not
that hard to tell, you've seen those dreaded motion-sensing
Halloween decorations that pop out and annoy everyone.
Believe it or not, the red light and motion sensing are
actually selling points for these dummy cameras.
There are several
other things to keep in mind when choosing a dummy camera.
When not using a dummy dome camera its important to remember
that about 99% of all security cameras have 2 cables. One is
for video and the other is for power. Some models only have
1 cable and it looks to be running nowhere because they only have a few inches of cable that don't allow for
properly hiding of the cable inside a wall or ceiling. Also
real security cameras don't have company logos or printing
on them like the sample dummy camera on the right that has a
"HubbCam" logo on the side and is also written on the lens.
Make sure that your lens has some sort of print on it. The
white lettering makes the lens look authentic, even if its
not. The white lettering appears on most lenses, like the
real lens on the left from our tech-army estore. Something
as simple as "8mm" is all it takes, avoid things like the "HubbCam"
written on the lens. These are all things to take into
consideration when
picking out your dummy security camera.
To recap, here is a checklist of things to have for your
dummy camera:
1. No Cheap Plastic Housing
2. No Red Light - disable it if you must
3. No Motion Sensing
4. Use 2 Cables in the back
5. Make sure that the cables look they could actually be
going somewhere.
6. No "HubbCam" type logos
7. White Lettering on the Lens
Interested in efficient dummy cameras? Check out our
Tech-Army estore for Dummy Dome Cameras
