Communications: electrical – Condition responsive indicating system – With particular coupling link
Reexamination Certificate
2000-06-06
2003-10-14
Crosland, Donnie L. (Department: 2632)
Communications: electrical
Condition responsive indicating system
With particular coupling link
C340S539250, C340S539260, C348S014010, C348S158000, C455S575100, C379S038000, C379S040000, C379S043000, C379S051000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06633231
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a communication device and an auxiliary device for communication and more particularly to a surveillance system that employs remote communication devices that can provide detection capabilities.
2. Description of the Prior Art
There has been available, for example, a communication device in the fields of crime prevention and fire prevention, associated with security systems each working under a contract with a security company, in order to protect properties such as buildings, warehouses and others. These devices can utilize surveillance sensors such as a smoke sensor, a thermal sensor, and an infrared sensor placed at predetermined sites in a building and establish an on-line connection with a surveillance center of the security company through indoor wiring.
A security contract fee relating to such a system, however, can be highly expensive and therefore, there has been only a minor proliferation of such security systems in the home management field. In addition to such poor proliferation, there has been a problem since, in a case where an abnormality is detected such as a fire at the surveillance center, the fire may grow to a large scale during the time period a guard or guards are on the way to the scene. Further, in a case where the abnormality is an intrusion by an unauthorized person, the intruder, could successfully complete an intended crime and leave the site of the crime before a guard or guards arrive at the site.
A more substantial security system to cope with such situations requires installment of a crime/fire prevention camera, which causes another problem in the home management field since the security contract fee is further raised according to the camera or cameras installed.
Furthermore, even if a security contract is concluded in home management, usually only abnormality detection is conducted at a surveillance center, but a subscriber on the move outside the home may not have immediate knowledge of an abnormality in the home.
In the fields of welfare and medical care, there are cases which require a constant care by a helper because of accompaniment of dangers and insecurities if no helper is available, for example, cases where an elderly person behaves abnormally, a condition where a patient in bed changes rapidly, and a baby or an infant has woken up. In such cases, however, there frequently arise a great burden in said constant care and the daily life of the family members, which limits the ability of the care providers to leave home. With such circumstances as the background, realization of a low cost security system has been strongly desired in the aspects of the crime/fire prevention, and welfare and medical care.
As one of the communication devices to achieve such a desire, there has been a proposal to provide a device which survey the outputs from various kinds of sensors and transmits surveillance information from the sensors to a portable terminal (PHS) for receiving the surveillance information from a transmitting means, so that information on abnormality occurrence can be sent to the PHS (see Japanese Laid Open Application No. 97-54886 for example).
In the above described system, a construction is adopted in which the various kinds of sensors, output surveillance means and transmitting means for surveillance information are online connected with a telephone line and therefore, there has been still another problem since not only is a placement work of the sensors necessary, but the subscriber cannot change arbitrarily installment sites of the sensors because surveillance by the sensors is conducted at a surveillance center. In addition to this problem, there has arisen a still further problem since all the pictures of surveillance, shot by, for example, the cameras installed at many different points, are watched collectively at the surveillance center side and the occurrence of an abnormality may be difficult among all the picture information. With such a prior art background, in order to precisely detect various factors for an abnormality occurrence, a necessity has arisen that various sensors (a fire sensor, crime sensor and other sensors) serving as suppliers of judgment standards are employed in an auxiliary manner and thereby, a crime prevention facility has become more complex according to the employment of such sensors, which causes an inevitable increase in cost of a contract with the surveillance center.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention has been made in light of such circumstances and it is an object of the present invention to provide a communication device enabling remote surveillance of any intruder or a fire in order to protect a property and to provide remote safety confirmation of human life, precisely in real time at a low cost by individuals, singularly or in a small number, without relying on a security company, a hired helper or the like.
A communication device to achieve the object, according to a first aspect of the present invention comprises: infrared detecting unit for detecting infrared rays, provided to a holder base for a portable telephone equipped with speech and image transmitting functions on commercial electromagnetic waves or to a vessel connected to the holder; and an auto-dialing instruction originating section for calling a preset telephone equipped with an image display function as a recipient automatically based on a predetermined output signal from an infrared detecting unit, provided to one of the portable phone, the holder for the portable telephone or to a vessel connected to the holder.
As a portable telephone equipped with an image transmitting function as described above, there can be exemplified various types of portable telephones: in which an image pick-up unit for an image is included; in a holder for which the image pick-up unit is included or in a vessel connected to the holder for which the image pick-up unit is included; and to which the image pick-up unit is connected by wired or wireless communication links so as to be located at a remote site from the portable telephone and the holder therefor.
In crime/fire prevention, for example, the communication devices with the above described construction and arrangement are preferably positioned at as many sites as possible in a building, a warehouse and so on, while, on the other hand, a telephone with an image display function (hereinafter referred to as a “telephone on the recipient side”, for convenience) which can be different from a portable telephone that a communication device would comprise (hereinafter referred to as a “telephone on the sender side”, for convenience) is made ready to use and the telephone on the recipient side is set so as to be addressed by the auto-dialing instruction originating section. It should be appreciated that the telephone on the recipient side may be of either an installed type or a portable type, and the portable type is preferable if a recipient is frequently on the move outside the home or office.
With such an arrangement, in a case where a suspicious person intrudes into a warehouse or the like, infrared rays radiated by the intruder are caught by the infrared detecting unit when the intruder enters the effective range of the communication device, or in a case where a fire breaks out, infrared rays radiated by a flame is caught by the infrared detecting unit, and a predetermined output signal is generated from the infrared detecting unit and thereby, the auto-dialing instruction originating section calls a preset, specified telephone on the recipient side automatically.
Since the telephone on the recipient side has a function of displaying picked-up image information (which is a still image or a dynamic image, but in the present specification, simply referred to as an “image”) sent from the sender side, a picture and voice of the suspicious person are transmitted in a case of intrusion of the suspicious person or a picture image of the fire and a series of crackling sounds generated by the fire are transm
Ebi Hiroyuki
Hayakawa Noboru
Okamoto Kazutaka
Crosland Donnie L.
Horiba Ltd.
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