Smart Home Security: The Cocoon Infrasonic Device

BY MATT WILLIAMS | 2 min read

The growth of "smart home" technology in recent years has led to a plethora of devices that can do just about anything. From making your coffee at a prescheduled time, to monitoring the food in your fridge for spoilage, to adjusting your thermostat based on your personal preferences and seasonal changes. But a particularly burgeoning area of innovation has been in realm of security devices, which owes a lot of growth in crowdfunding.

Consider the Cocoon, a smart home security device that listens to infrasonic sound waves to monitor a home. Whereas most security devices rely on cameras or motion detectors coupled with cloud computing or smartphone apps to monitor a single room, the Cocoon listens to sounds that are below the 20Hz range - and hence, undetectable to the human ear - combined with machine learning to protect an entire household for intruders.

If effective, this device could solve the shortcomings of existing camera/motion sensor smart home systems, which are limited to single rooms and require multiple devices or the setting up of "zones" in order to monitor an entire house. As Dan Conlon, co-founder of Cocoon, explained in a recent interview with Tech Crunch, the aim of his company was to create an all-in-one system that would eliminate this complicated setup:

The Cocoon's full range of features. Credit: indiegogo.com

“We believe that there is a smarter, more accessible way to deliver home security," he said. "Our SUBSOUND technology allows a user to protect a typical home with a single, simple device whilst machine learning algorithms learn what is normal for your home to reduce false alarms. Smartphone alerts deliver actionable information to you enabling you to take meaningful action. We’re putting people at the heart of home security.”

In addition to its infrasonic sound sensor, the Cocoon device comes with a traditional motion sensor, a microphone and an HD camera with night vision and a wide-angle lens. If the system detects what it believes to be unusual activity, the owner recieves a notification on their smartphone and can stream live audio or video to see what is happening in their house for themselves.

The accompanying Cocoon smartphone app also uses geofencing algorithms to let the system know if any household members or even pets are at home, so as to eliminate false positives. Other features include a warning siren that can be activated to disorient or frighten off intruders and full-color LED lighting that comes on when the device is recording or streaming.

Using a smartphone app, the Cocoon can alert homeowners of intruders. Credit: indiegogo.com

Back in November, the company behind the device launched an Indiegogo campaign to crowdfund their invention. As of December 7th, 2014, they had collected $218,652 USD, over twice their original goal. Now that they have their funding, the company is expected to begin deliveries of the device sometime between July and Septemeber of this year.

While some doubts remain as to whether or not the device can do all its advertised to do, the Leed-based British company behind it has a proven track record of investment and development. In addition to Dan Conlon having invented the web hosting system Donhost and the cloud storage device Humyo (which sold in 2005 and 2010 for $11 and $18 million respectively), Cocoon co-founder Sanjay Parekh was previously the CEO of Webexpenses, which sold in 2012.

All other the members of the Cocoon team have worked with Humyo and/or Trend Micro in the past, so there is little doubt as to their experience or sucess. And given the impressive growth of smartphone-enabled home security and other smart home systems, it was really only a matter of time before an integrated system of this kind was to become available.

For better or for worse, the future of homes is "smart", and connectivity the rule. And in the meantime, be sure to check out this demo video of the Cocoon and its various features:

Top image: Cocoon.life

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