What low cost 4G service works with remote security cameras?

**Uncle Fester** · 24-10-20, 06:59 PM

I bought a 4G camera and put in an Aldimobile SIM and no go.
I contacted Aldimobile support and nearly fell off my chair when I read that it is prohibited to use for alarms, medical alarms, GPS, tracking devices and the like, WTF!

Is anybody aware of these restrictions and knows who will provide cellular access to a 4G camera for a reasonable cost?
The Aldi mobile pack is $95 for 365 days. I don't need much GB.

Edit: Only just noticed that there is a CCTV forum but I thought this is about a service that is usually used by mobile phones, not the camera per se. Please move if anybody thinks I placed this thread wrong

**mtv** · 24-10-20, 07:26 PM

Moved thread to CCTV.

Many alarms and cameras use wireless/3G/4G connections.

**wotnot** · 25-10-20, 06:50 PM

Originally Posted by Uncle Fester

I bought a 4G camera and put in an Aldimobile SIM and no go.
I contacted Aldimobile support and nearly fell off my chair when I read that it is prohibited to use for alarms, medical alarms, GPS, tracking devices and the like, WTF!

Is anybody aware of these restrictions and knows who will provide cellular access to a 4G camera for a reasonable cost?
The Aldi mobile pack is $95 for 365 days. I don't need much GB.

That'd be odd ~ perhaps it's something to do with Aldi? (directives from the motherland? =)

Are you saying you wish to use said camera for cctv/security use? There are various laws in that regard (signage, handling of any data recorded etc etc), but it's not 'illegal' as such.

Better definition of 'cellular access' might be a clue ~ I've used standard amaysim sims for this purpose (no data, using MMS) and they use optus, and you can buy 'image sims' from various vendors using telstra as well.

**peteramjet** · 25-10-20, 08:18 PM

Originally Posted by Uncle Fester

Is anybody aware of these restrictions and knows who will provide cellular access to a 4G camera for a reasonable cost?

Telstra restrict data SIMs from being used in non-data devices, based on IMEI. Wouldn’t surprise me if they restrict phone SIMs in some data-only devices.

With Aldi being an MVNO of Telstra they may face the same restrictions. Can’t help unfortunately with what network will work.

Originally Posted by wotnot

There are various laws in that regard (signage, handling of any data recorded etc etc), but it's not 'illegal' as such.

Genuinely interested in what these laws are.

I have CCTV set up at various locations (NSW) without any signage and did not think there was any law requiring this. Likewise didn’t think there was any requirement with regards to the data.

Can you elaborate?

**wotnot** · 25-10-20, 09:07 PM

Originally Posted by peteramjet

Genuinely interested in what these laws are.

I have CCTV set up at various locations (NSW) without any signage and did not think there was any law requiring this. Likewise didn’t think there was any requirement with regards to the data.

Can you elaborate?

It's convoluted and depends on application, and is subject to state/territory legislation as well -- I think you can find particulars here -->

edit: I'm in Qld, thus ->

**secure** · 25-10-20, 09:17 PM

I have come across aldi sims working in alarm diallers ok.

**peteramjet** · 26-10-20, 05:43 AM

Originally Posted by wotnot

It's convoluted and depends on application, and is subject to state/territory legislation as well -- I think you can find particulars here -->

edit: I'm in Qld, thus ->

Thanks, but none of that info (even the QLD stuff) applies to individuals setting up cameras in a private capacity, but to Govt agencies and departments.

As an individual setting up CCTV, say for residential use or in a business, I don’t know of any requirement to display signs, etc

**wotnot** · 26-10-20, 10:08 AM

Originally Posted by peteramjet

Thanks, but none of that info (even the QLD stuff) applies to individuals setting up cameras in a private capacity, but to Govt agencies and departments.

As an individual setting up CCTV, say for residential use or in a business, I don’t know of any requirement to display signs, etc

Yeah, not the best link..but....the general rules still apply to individuals (I'll see if I can find better links tonight, but as I said it's convoluted) ; basically, anytime anyone has a reasonable expectation of privacy, you have to let them know they don't have that.

In essence, none of it really matters ... except if you end up in court ; if that happens, and any camera images end up as evidence, then it matters (did you have 'no trespassing' signs, did you have signs indicating CCTV is/was in use).

Businesses dealing with walk-in public have to display signs ; I know, I've done (too many =) camera installations. I think it's a load of crap personally...ie; you install said devices to 'catch' people shoplifting - you have to put up signs to inform them they're being recorded ; where exactly is the point of that? The signs could form a deterrent against possible theft, right? The whole thing's bizarre in my book, especially the 'right to be forgotten'. Residential is another story again ; you can't have cameras with 'incidental' vision coverage of your neighbour's property...'reasonable expectation of privacy'.

**Uncle Fester** · 26-10-20, 10:32 AM

Our service/SIM is suitable for use in mobile phones or tablets only and should not be used in alarms, medical alarms, GPS, tracking devices and the like. This use is prohibited in our Acceptable Use Policy and Terms and Conditions.

We may cancel the service without notice when we become aware of prohibited use. This means your device would be inoperable without your knowledge.

This is the exact wording and they are not mentioning cameras specifically, so it does not seem they are bothered with surveillance camera laws which are very different in each state.

In NSW there is basically no law that stops you from pointing a camera directly towards your neighbour, which we found out when a nasty violent neighbour pointed cameras directly at us to perv on my wife and harass us. We currently have an AVO application running against this arsehole but the magistrate crossed out cameras in the interim order.

It is only illegal to take footage from somebody performing a private act, which is possible in a back yard if that area can not be viewed from a public road.

However the camera I am talking about is on a different remote rural property that has no visible access to a neighbouring property but as said this is irrelevant as cameras are not even mentioned by Aldi.

The limitation makes no sense to me.

Is there anybody using a 4G cellular camera who can recommend their service that doesn't break the bank?
I hope this limitation is not a Telstra issue in general.
I have no Optus reception out there.

Thanks wotnot for the keyword: image sims. I will look into that but I am not aware that the camera can send MMS. The idea is to log in and live stream using the PTZ functions or view motion detected clips (it has a PIR sensor) with their free cloud service.

**wotnot** · 27-10-20, 11:57 AM

Originally Posted by peteramjet

As an individual setting up CCTV, say for residential use or in a business, I don’t know of any requirement to display signs, etc

My friend the wig recited this to me, relative to the use of no trespass signs ~ if a matter gets to court regarding trespass (which might be a preamble to the actual crime), and there were no signs indicating the property was private and trespass is not permitted, it very hard to demonstrate criminal intent ; the accused could claim they didn't know they were trespassing. Another one...for a long while (not sure if it's still the same due to the advent of dashcams), the police up here had to display a sign(s) beside a parked speed camera vehicle, declaring that's what was going on at that location..'police speed camera in use' or similar, on a small sign about 900x600 in a standing frame, that you could barely ever see while driving tbh...but... if one could prove that sign wasn't there at the time and clearly visible, you could be an arsehole in court towards not paying the fine, because procedure hadn't be followed...and the magistrate may have no alternative but to dismiss. Queensland mate...<grin>...I'm sure other queenslanders here are more than aware that every business using cctv/surveillance cameras have signs clearly displayed, but as far as I can tell, it's because they're workplaces (pretty strange stuff when you read into it =).

Originally Posted by Uncle Fester

This is the exact wording and they are not mentioning cameras specifically, so it does not seem they are bothered with surveillance camera laws which are very different in each state.

In NSW there is basically no law that stops you from pointing a camera directly towards your neighbour, which we found out when a nasty violent neighbour pointed cameras directly at us to perv on my wife and harass us. We currently have an AVO application running against this arsehole but the magistrate crossed out cameras in the interim order.

It is only illegal to take footage from somebody performing a private act, which is possible in a back yard if that area can not be viewed from a public road.

However the camera I am talking about is on a different remote rural property that has no visible access to a neighbouring property but as said this is irrelevant as cameras are not even mentioned by Aldi.

Yeah, my bad of sorts -- up here, the delimiter is whether or not the area being covered by surveillance, is a 'workplace', and many of the installations I've done are that, or more specifically residence/workplace ..ie; farms, where the residence is on the same property (which is in all fact the workplace as well...think farm residence of a dairy, or farm with machinery/tool shed). If you're a private individual and only setting up cctv to monitor your home, it's fairly unrestricted caveat privacy entitlements blablabla....like you've got with your neighbour. Even then, as you've discovered, getting someone (ie; the local police) to do something about a clear transition of the guidelines, is not a clear & cut process as it should be (IMHO). This is the worry of seeing lines like 'contact your state attorney-general' when it comes to reading these guidelines/laws, because they're open to interpretation (or subject to precedent court rulings) ; there's a real need for law reform in this country ; Qld is still basing it's stance on things like this, relative to 1899 privacy laws or somesuch (or the interpretation thereof) ; we need law reform due to the advancement of technology ; mobilephone usage in car would be an example of that ~ there's a lot of areas that need redressing, if that's not already obvious.

Originally Posted by Uncle Fester

The limitation makes no sense to me.

I wasn't wholly joking with my 'the motherland' quip ~ this may actually be a machination of the EU 2018 GDPR laws coming into effect, and they might be covering their arses.

If you don't have MMS send, it's likely neither here nor there for what you want to do - you need a data channel. (if one does have MMS send in camera unit, it's about the cheapest way to go..SIM-no data channel-PAYG) I found a lot of camera sellers toss their business to BetterLife for this connectivity () ; dunno why, it's just an observation I made trolling the web.

It'd be ideal to find someone providing a sim that's SIM+data channel with PAYG and only pay for the data you use, but I'm not sure if anyone's offering that plan (and you need telstra coverage) ~ send an email to Elon and point out starlink could fill this gap in the market =)

**admin** · 31-10-20, 05:08 PM

I would try a Telstra sim specifically for data.

I can remember reading somewhere about your issue in that they only allow the data on mobile phones.

**Uncle Fester** · 31-10-20, 08:38 PM

Their cheapest ($15) would be almost twice the cost of Aldi's 356day data plan for $95 but that is not the only issue.
I put the Aldi sim in an old phone, rang my main phone, then used a bit of data and then put the sim in the camera and voila, it connected.
So Aldi/Telstra is not blocking the IMEI as I first thought, or maybe an initial check discovered now a phone IMEI that satisfied the system and finalised the activation of the sim.

Now the issue: It makes calls.
So when I open the app and want to connect to the camera, my phone rings and I have to answer the call which I assume stays connected so that $15 is used up in 15 minutes because of the 1$/60c call rate, on top of the data usage, or maybe am I seeing this wrong?

After I set it up with the Aldi sim and played around for a minute while connected, I discovered the next day that I only used up 10cents. SD video was set by default but I also assume the compression is very good. Variable bit rate would mean that a static image like you have most of the time with a security cam would hardly need to transfer much data.

So for now I am just going to do the 'forbidden' thing and use it until they catch me.
I just put in every time $15 pay as you go credit that has a 365day expiry date, so no big loss if they block the service.
The fact that it actually makes calls might bypass the restriction, who knows.

**Uncle Fester** · 23-01-23, 10:43 AM

Originally Posted by Uncle Fester

So for now I am just going to do the 'forbidden' thing and use it until they catch me.
I just put in every time $15 pay as you go credit that has a 365day expiry date, so no big loss if they block the service.
The fact that it actually makes calls might bypass the restriction, who knows.

Update:
This worked well using Aldi data until a couple of months ago.
So now I am screwed by corporate greed.
I asked a seller of these 4G cameras and he told me that I would have to use an original Telstra SIM.
It would be Telstra that is prohibiting the use of these cameras with Telstra wholesale providers.

The running cost of $25 per month with a Telstra data SIM, just to occasionally check a camera is absolutely out of the question for me.

So to reiterate my OP, does anybody have a low cost service solution for these 4G cameras?

**secure** · 24-01-23, 12:14 AM

Maybe Amaysim sim cards, which use Optus network

**RedXT** · 24-01-23, 08:24 AM

Is it possible to use this

**Uncle Fester** · 25-01-23, 11:23 AM

cmobile uses Vodafone, no coverage sadly. Would have been a great deal. 300MB would be enough as I only need to watch a few 30 second long motion detect videos in SD highly compressed.

Yes I should revisit the Optus network.
There is no reception indoors but the camera is out doors with 2 antennas.
I will have to wait until April before I can wobble up there, so I will miss out on Amaysim's $7 first time deal to test this.

**RedXT** · 25-01-23, 02:31 PM

Originally Posted by Uncle Fester

cmobile uses Vodafone, no coverage sadly. Would have been a great deal. 300MB would be enough as I only need to watch a few 30 second long motion detect videos in SD highly compressed.

Yes I should revisit the Optus network.
There is no reception indoors but the camera is out doors with 2 antennas.
I will have to wait until April before I can wobble up there, so I will miss out on Amaysim's $7 first time deal to test this.

Cmobile has red deals which uses the Vodafone Network and Blue Deals which uses the Telstra Network

If u carn't find what u need Give Peter (he is the owner) a call he and or emma are great to deal with. No Indian Call Center

**peteramjet** · 25-01-23, 06:07 PM

Originally Posted by Uncle Fester

Update:
This worked well using Aldi data until a couple of months ago.
So now I am screwed by corporate greed.
I asked a seller of these 4G cameras and he told me that I would have to use an original Telstra SIM.
It would be Telstra that is prohibiting the use of these cameras with Telstra wholesale providers.

The running cost of $25 per month with a Telstra data SIM, just to occasionally check a camera is absolutely out of the question for me.

So to reiterate my OP, does anybody have a low cost service solution for these 4G cameras?

Aldi do data SIMs too, from $95/30GB for 365 days. If you are happy with the T Wholesale coverage it may be worth considering.

**Uncle Fester** · 25-01-23, 07:23 PM

Originally Posted by peteramjet

Aldi do data SIMs too, from $95/30GB for 365 days. If you are happy with the T Wholesale coverage it may be worth considering.

That is the one I was using until it got blocked.The camera's IMEI would be blocked, the SIM still works when I put it in my phone.The seller told me that Telstra whole sale is the problem and they have now a warning on their listing (EBay and Website) that the camera is not suitable for the Telstra network but after I rang they told me it works with a direct Telstra SIM.

**Uncle Fester** · 25-01-23, 07:27 PM

Originally Posted by RedXT

Cmobile has red deals which uses the Vodafone Network and Blue Deals which uses the Telstra Network

If u carn't find what u need Give Peter (he is the owner) a call he and or emma are great to deal with. No Indian Call Center

Thanks, I will call Peter/Emma about the Blue Deals (if I can get to them) and explain about my situation but as I mentioned above I am pretty sure my IMEI is blocked, so any T-wholesale SIM I throw in it won't work.