It happened on Monday afternoon when I was at work. Ring video doorbell notified me about someone at my Phoenix house front door. Probably a neighbor cat, who often likes to walk on the fence or chill on my front-yard. But wait a minute — it is 1:47 pm and the temperature is 105 F. In this heat, I have never seen this cat hanging out outside.

So I am pulling out my phone to see who is actually there. I see a man who looks like a package delivery guy. I also spot the garden spade in his hand. Okay, then he must be a landscaper, who made a mistake and came to the wrong house. Sometimes, this happens.

However, when I see him entering my backyard through the fence gate, I am getting a little nervous. Why he is going there? So I promptly switched from doorbell view to inside Canary security system. And I could not believe what I have seen there! This guy is walking in my living room like he is at his home.

Full burglary video

I immediately ran Canary alarm and it worked as intended. Loud siren scared him enough so he was eager to leave. Before he left, he scanned the kitchen peninsula to see if anything valuable is there. Thanks to his greed for old shopping discount batch cards and few random keys, his face was captured on the camera with a great level of detail. Phoenix Police Department is already in possession of these video files along with detailed mugshots.

While I have a few comments and objections towards Wink, Ring and Canary systems, they all proved to work well in this case. Look how Canary siren responded quickly. Also, note the living room temperature rose after a door glass was punctured. Arizona heat spreads fast!

Security siren responded instantly. Temperature increased later

Our North Phoenix neighborhood is always calm, where life flows slowly and not much is happening. Smart home gadgets like sensors, switches, locks, cameras, it was all installed by me just as an interesting side project. Sometimes it worked well, sometimes less well, but either way, it was always a fun thing to do. I never expected the day will come when it would be this useful for me.

Given this, I see how many smart home improvements could be implemented. I would like to share and test my ideas, but I need to call the insurance company and clean up this mess first.

Broken glass everywhere

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