- The silent bank alarm actually works more like a communication device than an actual alarm. The term itself is an oxymoron, but it is widely used today to describe a common method of alerting authorities to a crime in progress. In the case of a potentially violent crime, the silent alarm allows the bank to notify the authorities unbeknownst to the bad guys. This in turn greatly reduces the threat of violence to the employees and customers of the bank.
- It starts with the activation of a switch. A tiny button or buttons are hidden from view of the customers and their locations are known only by bank employees. They are hidden in such a way that bank employee can activate the switch without alerting the bad guys.
- Once the switch has been activated, it sends a signal to a private, third-party security monitoring vendor. The signal is transmitted to the security monitoring vendor via telephone lines, Internet or radio frequency transmissions.
- Upon receiving a signal from a bank, the security monitoring vendor performs certain checks to make sure the signal is legitimate. These checks are not known to the public. The secrecy of their internal systems prevents the bad guys from capturing, masking or overriding the signal's authenticity.
- Once the security monitoring vendor has established that the signal is genuine, it immediately alerts the authorities. The authorities can then dispatch various teams of appropriate officers to the bank without the bad guys' knowledge.
