Arlo Pro Floodlight Jamming

[caddy123]

Neighbor is jamming our cameras.  Similar to a previous post someone made in 2019 (now closed) the cameras will allow you to watch live camera footage but the system will not pick up on any movement(s) and therefore do not automatically record anything.  It happens roughly at the same time each day and whether we reset the hub or the cameras they will not record based on movement. 

Note our neighbor is a known abuser of kids and his ex-wife and has poisoned our dogs and also works for a security company.  The system is fine when he is not at home, otherwise, when he arrives home the system goes down. 

I know it's illegal, and I also know our local law enforcement does not have the tools or the capacity to look into this. 

Thoughts on a spectrum analyzer?  I could probably pick one up and record the signals when he is gone vs. when is he home and when our camera systems goes down. 

I called Arlo and they said I should change channels on the Wi-Fi.  Um, well, yeah, if the cameras didn't have a WiFi signal and were dropping I would say it's a WiFi issue.  That is not the case.  It's only been happening recently and I'm just starting my research. 

Thoughts from the community on an appropriate course of action?

[Dannybear]

Confirm that it is not something environmental, like sun reflecting of shiny surfaces which would explain why it happens same time of day. Does the issue occur at night?

Since you have wifi access to the camera with live view. The initial trigger for motion is from the infrared motion sensor that could be desensitised by infrared floodlights which are invisible to the eyes.

If the camera is looking through a window, the sensor will not work very well.

A spectrum analyser will not be useful in the above unless it is wifi related. You would need something like a infrared camera or flir to see if a floodlight is operating.

[StephenB]

---

@caddy123 wrote:

Neighbor is jamming our cameras.  Similar to a previous post someone made in 2019 (now closed) the cameras will allow you to watch live camera footage but the system will not pick up on any movement(s) and therefore do not automatically record anything.  

---

FWIW, I have seen a couple of other users recently say that their cameras aren't recording at night.  So this might not be something the neighbor is doing.

If you can livestream the cameras all the time, then this isn't a result of jamming the signal.  I agree with @Dannybear that a spectrum analyzer won't help, as that would only detect wifi jamming (or interference) - and you have ruled that out.

If this is linked somehow to the Passive Infrared (PIR) sensor, then there would need to be a direct line of sight between the device that is disabling it and the camera.  That would presumably be located on the neighbor's property.  If one or more of the disabled cameras isn't aimed towards his property, then that wouldn't be the cause.

I suggest

• confirming that you can make a manual recording when the motion detection isn't working. 
• See if the motion detection test works during those hours.  https://kb.arlo.com/41/How-do-I-change-the-motion-sensitivity-on-my-Arlo-camera
• moving a camera indoors as a test, and see if it detects motion during those hours.

You could also enable audio detection (as a test) and see if that gives you recordings when motion detection isn't.   

If you are using geofencing or scheduling, then you might want to drop those for now, and just use the armed mode.  If you have activity zones enabled, you might also want to disable them on one of the cameras and see if that makes any difference.