Ting (alarm)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Ting (stylized "ting") is a proactive domestic voltage monitor, alarm, and app.[1] The 4 inches (10 cm) tall 2.5 inches (6.4 cm) 2.5 oblong off-white device monitors the home's electrical system for micro-arcs (or scintillations)[2] 30 million times per second for the cumulative precursor events of an electrical house fire.
One week of monitoring provides a baseline for any given household. An Internet of Things (IOT) device plugged into any three-pronged (preferably seldom used) electrical outlet uploads the consumer's data to its manufacturer, Whisker Labs.[3][4][5][6] En toto the nationwide fleet of sensors installed in more than 700,000 homes[7] generates approximately 30 GB of data per second.[8]
Whisker Labs (founded in 2014 and based in Germantown, Maryland)[2] claims to have detected electrical fire faults in 1 of 150 homes without any false positives.[2] Water and fire hazards combined have been detected on average in 1 of 60 homes annually, and overall 80%[9] (approximately four in five)[10] of electrical fires in its network have been prevented. Prevention being cheaper than replacement, Ting has been offered for free to more than two million policy holders[7] by a large cohort of the U.S. insurance industry, including but not limited to State Farm (albeit not in Alaska, Delaware, North Carolina, South Dakota, and Wyoming),[11] Westfield Insurance,[12][13] Ohio Mutual, reinsurer PURE Insurance (albeit not in Idaho, Maine, Mississippi, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming),[14] Nationwide Insurance,[9] Philadelphia Contributionship, HSB,[15] Farm Insurance Bureau of Michigan,[16] Liberty Mutual,[8] and Erie Insurance.[17]
The service, by means of machine learning analysis of big data from over a million sensors[18] (over 650,000 home years of monitoring data)[9] has detected patterns heretofore not apparent amongst varying electrical codes, the decade of and type of wiring, etc. Approximately 60% of hazards detected stemmed from faulty (degraded) wiring, and 40% from appliances. One unexpected new danger, flagged in 2024, were rotating Christmas trees.[19][20]
