Gunshot detection systems are seeing increased demand amid rampant gun violence, especially in the U.S. That said, suppliers of gunshot detection systems had a strong presence at this year’s ISC West. Two of them, Acoem and Shooter Detection Systems (SDS), spoke to asmag.com on their technologies and what made them stand out.
Gunshot detection systems are strongly demanded in parts of the world where gun violence is rampant. This is especially the case in the U.S., where
Pew Research Center data suggest there were 13.7 gun deaths per 100,000 people in 2023. This makes gunshot detection systems more needed than ever in the U.S. to detect and respond to gunshots.
Gunshot detection systems can be useful in different vertical markets. Needless to say, these include school campuses where, at least in the U.S., there were 1,375
school shootings at public and private elementary and secondary schools between the 2000-2001 and 2021-2022 school years. Other places that can benefit from gunshot detection include military sites, healthcare facilities, retail stores and public spaces.
Given the strong demand for gunshot detection in the US market, manufacturers and suppliers of gunshot detection systems actively took part in ISC West 2025, where around 10 exhibitors showcased related products and solutions. Two of them, Acoem and Shooter Detection Systems, spoke to asmag.com on their cutting-edge technologies. Below we take a closer look.
Acoem
Acoem, a global leader in advanced physical security solutions, unveiled their ATD (acoustic threat detection) technology. While many gunshot detection systems require multiple sensors for triangulation, Acoem’s ATD is a single sensor allowing for greater deployment flexibility. The solution also features immediate camera slewing, where PTZ cameras are instantly directed toward the source of gunfire.
“So there's multiple microphones inside of the sensor, and we do the processing on the edge. There's a device inside the sensor that does the detect and locate … and we're able to send a signal directly from the sensor to the camera to locate it. Essentially, it is like a triangulation just happening inside the one unit. We can give the user a vector and a distance and elevation. We can connect it to a camera and control it directly to focus and zoom in on that spot,” said Timothy English, Managing Director of Acoem.
The system, which can differentiate between threats and non-threats using an AI neural network trained on 30 years of data, is ideal for a variety of end user entities, especially those with large outdoor areas.
“These include schools and campuses where they have large outdoor areas, where people are walking; parking lot areas where a lot of violent incidents occur; stadiums and arenas … these are places that you might want to provide this layer of protection,” English said. “One of our top markets is critical infrastructure, something like an electric substation, where they have a vulnerability from the station of damaging equipment with gunshots. So that's a big market for us.”
Acoem’s ADT technology integrates with leading video management systems, including Hanwha Wisenet, Milestone, Avigilon and Genetec. This helps minimize deployment costs and complexity.
Shooter Detection Systems
Shooter Detection Systems, owned by Alarm.com, showcased their new Perimeter Outdoor Gunshot Detection System, which leverages the dual technologies of audible acoustics and infrared flash detection.
“It's based on the same technology that we innovated and pioneered on the indoor sensor. It’s a dual tech technology, so those two technologies are independent of one another. So you have audible acoustic and then you have the infrared flash from a muzzle. The probability of those two things happening at the same time and not being a gunshot is very, very low. So one of our claims of fame is having extremely high accuracy,” said James Reno, VP of Commercial Sales at Alarm.com.
Having a coverage area of 100-150 feet, the sensor is ideal for large public spaces. “Large populations of people, whether it's a convention center like this, an airport, a football stadium, those types of folks … they tend to be okay with making sure that they are protected,” Reno said. “And then there's a third category of assets. A lot of people shoot at critical infrastructure. And obviously, if you bring down anything that would harm the continuity of a business, that's going to be a big deal. So we've seen a lot of interest from those types of sectors when it comes to outdoor shot detection, because that's not protecting people as much as it is assets.”
Last but not least, the system integrates with a number of video surveillance and access control manufacturers – 38, to be exact.
“So we have integrations with 38 different manufacturers. Those are going to be all your leading video manufacturers that you'll see here on the floor today, all the leading access control and then mass notification system. So our large clientele typically have an ecosystem of various video access control and mass notification and so we've done a really good job with 38 different integrations to kind of accommodate their environment and make sure we have that available to them,” Reno said.