Trying to help out our HOA - LTS DVR

So our HOA has about 5 different security cam systems (one at each of our gates) that they have been unable to access for at least 3-years now! I went and took a look at one this morning so see what I can do - and what a mess.

We don't have internet access at the gates so if anyone ever wanted to view the footage, they would have to physically drive to the location. Whoever installed these systems used a cheap TP-Link WiFi router (inside of a metal box) and I guess they would connect to the wifi and then download the files... (the router has a short ethernet cable that connects to the DVR - I don't understand why they needed the wifi router at all, but that is another story.

The only identifying info on the DVR (it's screwed to a board and I could not see the front or bottom, but there was a QR code). I believe it is a LT Security (rebranded Hikvision?) 4 channel system that I have no idea how old it is. I am told that the password is some sort of 'drawing' (I think they mean pattern line on Android phone). I am waiting to see if they will let me remove the DVR and take it home to look at.

I have zero experience with a DVR, I have always used Blue Iris on a computer. Is resetting this DVR doable?

LTS sells rebranded Hikvision products. I'm not certain what the equivalent Hikvision model would be.
This is an older model that was introduced in 2015, so it's questionable how much value it has left.

The broader question is more what do they want to achieve and are they willing to spend what may be required.

I'm guessing the HOA may have formerly had security guards. How do they control access to the 'gates'? Roughly how many homes in the HOA?

Over 1,000 single family homes, gate openers and a kiosk where you can lookup a resident by name and it will call the house. (20 year old system)

2015 sounds about right for the cameras. Our reserve study indicates the useful life of the system was 8 years and is due not to be replaced. An incident happened where a young man od'd on fentanyl and where we live, the District Attorney tries to prosecute the suppliers for murder (they were trying to access the video at the gates to help in the investigation).

Sadly, most of the residents believe we have working camera's... The biggest problem with getting a new system installed is lack of internet access at the gates. Paying someone to drive out to one of the systems to download the files is ridiculous

Thanks for your help

eeeeesh said:

Over 1,000 single family homes, gate openers and a kiosk where you can lookup a resident by name and it will call the house. (20 year old system)

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So they're paying for phone service at each gate (landline or cellular); perhaps phone/intercom are only at certain gates. It might be more worthwhile to pay for internet and use VOIP for the gate calls (could even potentially record the calls if you post a notice). Depending on the terrain and distances, there's a chance you could do point to point or point to multi point wifi to some of the locations. @bigredfish set up a system for his HOA and used point to point wifi to willing nearby houses for at least some of the cameras IIRC (he may have moved since).

I imagine updating those systems when people move and keeping all 5 in sync is a little fun. Do the residents have remotes or have to enter a code? Does someone employed by the HOA handle this or do they contract it out? This could be a reason to keep as is, remote management of some of those systems could be challenging on anything but POTS.

Cameras that do license plate recognition are expensive (they call it ANPR) but nice for this sort of thing, plate matches open the gate. It's also nice to have LPR to flag the outliers more easily.

eeeeesh said:

An incident happened where a young man od'd on fentanyl and where we live, the District Attorney tries to prosecute the suppliers for murder (they were trying to access the video at the gates to help in the investigation).

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If nothing else, you could cut power to prevent footage from getting overwritten.

If you haven't yet, give the manual a read
Depending on the firmware version, there are different potential methods to reset the password. Some depend on the email used during setup. You may need to contact an LTS dealer. I'd also try some stupid simple patterns, the web interface will have an actual password. If they're still around, the HOA could try to contact whoever installed the system.

NVRs and DVRs typically have drives that are in unique proprietary formats. I wouldn't recommend it as a first option, but there is forensic recovery software that works on the drives from NVRs and DVRs.

If you simply plug into the wifi router and try to access the NVR, admin as the user name and password. I can't remember when they started to require more secure passwords.

This method only work is they didn't enter a recovery email at setup:

We tried the Point to Point radios at first (1/4 mile between the two locations) but trees made it not reliable. You really need good line of sight for that.

We (HOA with 41 homes) bit the bullet and had Internet service installed for both locations. I cant recall the exact amount but it was something like $400 per location. Monthly charges for dedicated IPs are about $180

If an HOA with 1000 homes can't be bothered to spend a couple of $ to get Internet service ran, and another say $1000 per location (NVR, Router, 2 cameras) to get reasonably good video coverage, I would be moving.

Thanks tangent and bigredfish for your replies. Yes residents have remotes and they can also enter the gate code at the kiosks. I made a mistake in my post, there are actually (7) gates

First of all, I think it is safe to say, that our management (Board of Directors) has really dropped the ball on a number of different items which is one of the reason why I recently got involved.

We are currently spending almost $2k a month on telephone service - which I believe is for the (7) gates, and I think they are hardwired - but trying to get any info is like pulling teeth. The community is 20 years old, and internet is basically through spectrum cable or DSL through the phone company, although the newest section does have fiber. Our streets were recently repaved (over $6 million) which would have been a good opportunity to run internet to the gates before hand, but that is now a missed opportunity.

The community was designed around 2 main gates, and I agree, there is no reason to have a 'kiosk' at each gate for 'visitors' - they could be directed to these two main access point, but then again the real problem is lack of internet at the gates for the cameras and I personally think the only real solution going forward is to get this taken care of one way or another. This community has a $2.5 Million annual budget and currently has $20k set aside for new video system at each gate and the kiosks are slated to be replaced in the next couple of years at a cost of $6k each. It doesn't make sense not to tie these two systems together with internet access and in this day and age, 'security' is on everyone's mind.

They HOA claims they did try to contact the old installer, and the manufacturer - no luck. so they just let everyone think the cameras were working for the last 3 years...

We definitely need to look into Flock

You say there’s no internet at the gates, but I’ll bet there is.
There was no internet connection with a modem at our two locations either. But the lines servicing the neighborhood ( spectrum) ran right past the locations. One within 15 ft the other about 60 ft.

We had the cable/internet company provide a drop and service to an outdoor rated NEMA box that we paid an electrician to run power to from HOA property.

Each box holds the cable modem, router. NVR and has been in operation with just 1 lost hard drive since 2017

You should look into that before going to expensive and not so great Flock

eeeeesh said:

We definitely need to look into Flock

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Many LEO have said Flock is very piss poor quality, especially at night. This is a comment from an LE friend of mine.

eeeeesh said:

Thanks tangent and bigredfish for your replies. Yes residents have remotes and they can also enter the gate code at the kiosks. I made a mistake in my post, there are actually (7) gates

First of all, I think it is safe to say, that our management (Board of Directors) has really dropped the ball on a number of different items which is one of the reason why I recently got involved.

We are currently spending almost $2k a month on telephone service - which I believe is for the (7) gates, and I think they are hardwired - but trying to get any info is like pulling teeth. The community is 20 years old, and internet is basically through spectrum cable or DSL through the phone company, although the newest section does have fiber. Our streets were recently repaved (over $6 million) which would have been a good opportunity to run internet to the gates before hand, but that is now a missed opportunity.

The community was designed around 2 main gates, and I agree, there is no reason to have a 'kiosk' at each gate for 'visitors' - they could be directed to these two main access point, but then again the real problem is lack of internet at the gates for the cameras and I personally think the only real solution going forward is to get this taken care of one way or another. This community has a $2.5 Million annual budget and currently has $20k set aside for new video system at each gate and the kiosks are slated to be replaced in the next couple of years at a cost of $6k each. It doesn't make sense not to tie these two systems together with internet access and in this day and age, 'security' is on everyone's mind.

They HOA claims they did try to contact the old installer, and the manufacturer - no luck. so they just let everyone think the cameras were working for the last 3 years...

We definitely need to look into Flock

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"Our streets were recently repaved (over $6 million) which would have been a good opportunity to run internet to the gates before hand, but that is now a missed opportunity."

Well, this does seem to be fairly normal .. one hand not telling the other ..

what a missed opportunity ...

is their POTS to the gates ? ( phone lines ) .. DSL would be ok then probably ..

I’ll bet $100 right now if you call Spectrum and ask them to provide a quote to establish Internet service at your entrances, they’ll find a trunk line nearby to do so

Service doesn’t have to be inside the guard shack. A NEMA box attached to an entrance wall or pole will do. Wherever you can get electricity and internet to meet. One of ours is on the backside of the entrance wall, the other on a concrete pedestal we installed. Cable company and power company/ electrician both ran service to it. Our cameras are on poles we installed 15ft and 60ft away respectively

eeeeesh said:

Whoever installed these systems used a cheap TP-Link WiFi router

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How many ethernet ports are in use on the router? There may even already be internet at the gates. How many cameras are there at each gate?

eeeeesh said:

We are currently spending almost $2k a month on telephone service - which I believe is for the (7) gates, and I think they are hardwired - but trying to get any info is like pulling teeth

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That could include some phones/internet at the HOA office. To an extent they probably don't know. I imagine you also have all the fun a management company brings to an HOA.

eeeeesh said:

The community was designed around 2 main gates, and I agree, there is no reason to have a 'kiosk' at each gate for 'visitors' - they could be directed to these two main access point,

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The biggest issues here are deliveries and emergency response and gps directions, but they probably have Knox boxes at all gates.

tangent said:

I imagine updating those systems when people move and keeping all 5 in sync is a little fun. ... Does someone employed by the HOA handle this or do they contract it out?

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I'd still like to know how they handle updating the intercoms and managing the remotes. I'd be curious to know the model number of the gate intercom or to see a picture of it (some are internet enabled).

Ri22o said:

Many LEO have said Flock is very piss poor quality, especially at night. This is a comment from an LE friend of mine.

View attachment 190839

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Especially the states with the 3M printed plates - has made Flock almost useless at night.

router - one connection and it is to the DVR. I think it was just to provide wireless access to the DVR, but as I mentioned, why bother - just open the case and connect directly to the DVR

Not allowed to have any 'on-site' management. Property Management Company is required to maintain their own office off site

Knox boxes for police and fire access at all gates

Intercom is branded NKS, but it looks like the DoorKing in this video



I found a proposal from the company that maintains our gates - $160k for new video systems at all (7) gates with a $2k monthly charge (probably for cell service)

eeeeesh said:

Intercom is branded NKS, but it looks like the DoorKing in this video

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That's DKS, Door King's logo. I figured it was probably doorking. Not that you'd learn a ton or should (you could get the model or hw/sw revision), but I'd practically guarantee you could get into the intercom if you wanted to with a standard doorking key off of ebay. I can't remember if the old models even had a tamper switch. It is possible to manage these over the internet but that may require additional hardware or upgrading the intercom.

eeeeesh said:

Property Management Company is required to maintain their own office off site

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In my experience, all the 'fun' a management company brings to the situation makes actually improving any of this in a meaningful way rather difficult. I imagine they contract out the management of the system and probably do manage the intercoms remotely over POTS (plain old telephone service). It's been a while since I've had occasion to remotely make changes to a door king intercom, I seem to recall it was DTMF based not FSK.

eeeeesh said:

but as I mentioned, why bother - just open the case and connect directly to the DVR

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it makes it easier to connect, no need to assign your computer a static ip / know what subnet it's in. Can sit there in the comfort of your vehicle and connect. It doesn't really sound like the cameras were ever accessed much. I imagine the HOA's biggest concern would actually be someone damaging the gate or intercom.

tangent said:

it makes it easier to connect, no need to assign your computer a static ip / know what subnet it's in. Can sit there in the comfort of your vehicle and connect. It doesn't really sound like the cameras were ever accessed much. I imagine the HOA's biggest concern would actually be someone damaging the gate or intercom.

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That makes sense. Trying to sort through old minutes - the company was charging $200 for the first hour and $125 per hour after that to pull video, and yes, the gates do get damage

bigredfish - sorry I missed your earlier post. With cable running to all the houses, I agree - I don't see why they can't. (even if we just tried to work out a deal with an adjacent homeowner kind of thing). I just need to get more info on what is going on and the board currently in control was actually voted out, but they refused to step down and it is going to court. (they lost once already but appealed it - they have unlimited funds. (our HOA money) and they are trying to drag it out as long as they can

eeeeesh said:

That makes sense. Trying to sort through old minutes - the company was charging $200 for the first hour and $125 per hour after that to pull video, and yes, the gates do get damage

bigredfish - sorry I missed your earlier post. With cable running to all the houses, I agree - I don't see why they can't. (even if we just tried to work out a deal with an adjacent homeowner kind of thing). I just need to get more info on what is going on and the board currently in control was actually voted out, but they refused to step down and it is going to court. (they lost once already but appealed it - they have unlimited funds. (our HOA money) and they are trying to drag it out as long as they can

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HOA .. ouch ..

eeeeesh said:

I found a proposal from the company that maintains our gates - $160k for new video systems at all (7) gates with a $2k monthly charge (probably for cell service)

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That's pretty steep. I'd expect a small fraction of that monthly cost goes to actual expenses. Companies like this love SLAs.

Also amusing, with 4 digit codes 1,000 of the possible 10,000 codes are in use. You've got a 1 in 10 chance of guessing a random code that works

Have you investigated LoRaWan. It's in the 902-928 MHz band.
I have built several networks using that technology. One central
point with with a high-gain omni-directional antenna. AS a quick
reference.

tangent said:

That's pretty steep. I'd expect a small fraction of that monthly cost goes to actual expenses. Companies like this love SLAs.

Also amusing, with 4 digit codes 1,000 of the possible 10,000 codes are in use. You've got a 1 in 10 chance of guessing a random code that works

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Our 'Management' likes to use their 'preferred vendors' (can you say cronyism, nepotism and corruption) and our HOA president is behind most of it, but he is on the way out.