A Security System Built with Mobile and IoT Technologies

According to the U.S. Bureau of Justice, there were 15.9 million property crimes in the U.S. in 2016. It is at a rate of 119.4 invasions per 1,000 households. Home security providers, such as ADT, charge consumers monthly subscription fees for home monitoring system and services. In this research, we address this issue by proposing an easy-to-use, customizable and affordable home security system for the public. Total Security, a Raspberry Pi-based home security system, was designed to monitor and control your home security remotely. The whole system consists of a system server, Raspberry Pi devices, sensors and an Android application. MQ Telemetry Transport (MQTT) Paho protocol is implemented to communicate between sensors, system server and the Android application. With the use of Total Security Android application, the users can connect to the self-monitoring security system, arm and disarm the system, monitor real-time status of sensors, enable notification upon sensor activation, and view logs of system activity. The contribution of this research is that we demonstrated it is possible to build an affordable home security system with existing devices and technologies. Total Security not only provides the users with an ability to fully control their home security system remotely, but it also considers the extendibility by implementing state-of-the-art protocols.