KEN KIRSCHENBAUM, ESQ
ALARM - SECURITY INDUSTRY LEGAL EMAIL NEWSLETTER / THE ALARM EXCHANGE
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M2M communication failure discussion
April 14, 2026
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M2M communication failure discussion
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Ken
M2M is a popular alarm communicator. The device can capture an older telephone dialer’s data then retransmit it over the Internet breathing new life into outmoded equipment. It's low cost and AHJ approvals have boosted its market share, particularly in the commercial fire alarm segment.
Following a recent extended service outage that blocked alarm transmission from protected premises to monitoring centers, due to a failure at M2M’s data relay center,
Andrew Klein posted this question on Facebook’s Burglar Alarms Online Group Page:
"I have a question… The fact that one data center outage brought down the M2M unit today… How do they have UL commercial fire alarm listing if they are this easily compromised? Are all brands this flimsy?"
David Schwartz replied:
"I think every vendor has an outage at some point; it's really more an issue of for how long and how they handle the fallout."
My response:
The inquiry and response deserves a more thorough response.
The day-to-day reliability of a data center used for alarm re-transmission isn’t under UL’s purview as it relates to listing a communication device. It’s a given that every data center will have outages. The go-to standard is the “nines of reliability”. It’s pretty straightforward. 3 nines 99.9% uptime equates to 8.77 hours of total downtime per year. 4 nines 99.99% is 52.56 minutes. 5 nines 99.999% is less than 5.26 minutes of downtime per year.
5 nines is considered the gold standard for data centers; less than 5.26 minutes per year. While security industry data re-transmitters may strive for this standard, none commit to it. The reality is downtime is somewhere between an hour and 8.75 hours per year, likely more.
So why would anyone in good faith ever insert an unnecessary point of failure that itself can impose significant downtime in addition to the ISP and monitoring centers’ existing, unavoidable downtime risk?
Would you want to sleep in a hotel with a fire alarm system that takes a 24-hour per year vacation from notifying authorities. I wouldn’t.
To Mr. Schwartz’ point, vendors will absolutely have failures. While it’s impossible to eliminate these points of failure entirely, it is entirely possible to avoid unnecessary ones and it’s critical to do so when lives and property depend on it. “Fallout” as Schwartz terms the result of a failure, in Commercial fire alarm monitoring, at worst, is catastrophic loss of life and property and at best is the loss of reputation.
My consulting practice helps installing companies, manufacturers and monitoring centers, big and small with these challenges every day and has decades of experience. Proper assessment of new technology and equipment is often ignored, even by the most savvy players in our industry. The choices you make often have far reaching implications. Not just on life and limb, but also on the valuation of your company when it’s time to sell. If you’re not already making properly thought out choices, there’s no better time to start.
Peter Goldring, President
Goldring Protection
516 640 1410
peter@goldrightprotection.com
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Response
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Introducing a weakness in the system is not wise and could rise to the level of negligence, or more than mere negligence, such as gross negligence, and it's entirely unnecessary. There is something to the adage, "do it right the first time".
Peter is a fire commissioner in New Jersey, expert in fire and other security systems and available to consult with your fire or security business.
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Ken Kirschenbaum,Esq
Kirschenbaum & Kirschenbaum PC
Attorneys at Law
200 Garden City Plaza
Garden City, NY 11530
516 747 6700 x 301
ken@kirschenbaumesq.com
www.KirschenbaumEsq.com