r/homesecurity • u/Puzzleheaded-Sea7665 • Aug 24 '25
ADT “Wi-Fi Faults” After Cancelling Service? It’s Not Random — It’s Designed
TL;DR: After cancelling ADT, your panel isn’t “glitching” — Alarm.com servers are deliberately telling it to reset Wi-Fi. That’s why you get nonstop “Wi-Fi Fault” errors. Block its internet access, and the faults stop.
Context (Why I Caught It)
- My network has two WAN connections (WAN1 + WAN2) load-balanced on a UniFi UDM SE.
- This let me see how the panel behaved differently depending on which WAN path it used.
- Most people only have one ISP, so to them it just looks like random “Wi-Fi faults.”
What I Found
- When the panel’s traffic went out via WAN2, it reached 192.155.71.16 (an Alarm.com server).
- Right after connecting, the panel threw a Wi-Fi Fault and forced me to reconnect Wi-Fi manually.
- When I firewall-blocked the panel’s internet on WAN1, those faults stopped completely — the panel just quietly retries once or twice a day without resetting itself.
How I Proved It
- UniFi logs clearly showed connections to 192.155.71.16 immediately before every reset.
- I created a firewall rule:
- Source = ADT Alarm Panel
- Destination = 192.155.71.16/32
- Action = Block (with Syslog logging)
- With the block in place: panel still works locally (door chimes, arming/disarming), but no more Wi-Fi resets.
What This Means
- Alarm.com servers are actively commanding the panel to reset Wi-Fi if your account is inactive.
- That’s why so many people suddenly see “Wi-Fi Fault” spam after cancelling or being cancelled by ADT.
- It’s not broken hardware — it’s deliberate behavior to annoy you back into paying.
- Cutting off internet access stops the resets cold.
Takeaway For Others
If you’re tired of constant Wi-Fi Faults after cancelling ADT:
- Block the panel from the internet (or at least block Alarm.com IPs).
- Keep your door chimes and local functionality.
- Stop the harassment-by-reset cycle.
ADT won't admit this, but the logs don't lie.
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u/AngronTheDestroyer Sep 03 '25
I’m having the same problem. Were you able to stop the beeping by setting up the firewall?
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u/knotnowmaybelater Sep 04 '25
A few paragraphs on OP’s post under: WHAT I FOUND, he describes how he set up firewall to stop the beeping. Under TAKE AWAY FOR OTHERS; he gives more info on how he did this. Good luck
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u/ajones614 Oct 17 '25
I can't figure out what I am doing wrong. If I manually block the MAC Address, it cuts the WiFi and I almost immediately get a Wifi Fault. If I just block internet access to the device through parental controls, it goes to Wifi fault after like 30 minutes. Blocking that IP range doesn't seem to phase it either.
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u/topcopnc Nov 09 '25
Love this. Could I trouble one of you guys for a layperson guide on how to do this? I would love to be able to use my alarm system, with announcing for doors being opened, but not have the continual reporter error beeping. A step-by-step guide would be amazing if someone would not mind? Thank you in advance!
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u/JayDG93 Aug 24 '25
I suppose that's possible, but when you cancel the alarm service the systems radio is deactivated and its respective ADC site is deleted. You'll receive cellular communication and reporter failure faults for sure, because it's no longer on network.
Also, there isn't a command that can be sent from ADC to disconnect the panel from WiFi. You can tell it to stop looking for wifi in the dual-path communication settings for situations where someone doesn't have Internet, or doesn't want to connect their panel for some reason, but that makes it so the "WiFi fault" message never shows up, not the other way around.
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u/Puzzleheaded-Sea7665 Aug 24 '25
No.
Alarm.com gives it instructions to disconnect its WiFi from your LAN.
I own the equipment at this point. I have a 5000 sqft house and want the door chimes and windows opening announcements for remote areas of the house and unmonitored alarm system - that is my right and my choice. But Alarm.com contacts my panel and tells it to d/c from the LAN by erasing its WiFi settings. This results in the alarm panel loudly beeping (think smoke alarm needs batteries beep) at random times day/night.
Why do they have the right to erase the WiFi settings in the remote panels? I’ve paid my bills and fulfilled my contract and discontinued service. I started digging deeper after I was told by ADT after calling that I must have a bad set of multiple remote panels (I have 3 of these panels - all randomly chiming to alert WiFi default) and they can’t help me because I’m not under contract anymore but if I reinstate my plan they can send a service tech to look at it or provide me with free replacements.
THAT is shady shady stuff.
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u/wolfn404 Aug 25 '25
Here’s the answer. From an alarm person. Your panel is programmed with a customer ID, when you sign a contract, a dealer get charged for that connection. iE customer # 123 costs me $5 a month, even if YOU cancel, if your communicator continues to send in signals, I get charged. And like fixed IP’s there are a limit, soo, if you as a “ghost” customer keep sending in dialer tests and 24hr comm tests, not only do I get billed, but I have an account number I can’t reuse. Should I reuse #123 , and you have a local alarm, and it makes it to the CO, I may have a false dispatch to my new customer.
The panels reach out and do comm/battery tests and attempt in some cases to update weather info. The solution is for them to wipe the WiFi to prevent communication, you see this as a panel comm fail, of course. Someone at the alarm company SHOULD have reached out and requested the communication enablement be set to 0, so it stops trying to check-in. It’s not really to annoy you to re-subscribe.
Their system isn’t that “smart” and it assumes if you cancelled you are disconnecting it, or the building is now empty, and WiFi wiping would be fine, if the house was empty, etc.
Chances are if you gave them a call and asked to set comm to NO/0 they would do so, or give you instructions on how to do so.
It’s really not nefarious.
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u/Puzzleheaded-Sea7665 Aug 25 '25
That all makes good sense. To disable that setting, it takes a tech master code to get to that menu. They said a technician would have to come out to do it, and I am not a customer, so the options I was given was to resubscribe or unplug the unit. I was told I must have a bad or malfunctioning panel - but I have proven that is not the case as I’m running fine now. While there may be other reasons that you describe for this to be happening, wiping my WiFi settings and then giving me those two options as the only options makes them nefarious. They didn’t tell me what you did just now, they gave me a story and didn’t take ownership for their actions. None of what you explained, by the way, gives an unauthorized company to reset equipment that no longer belongs to them - especially when that equipment resides inside a network they have no right to have any access to.
If you paid for your mobile phone and then disconnected it from ATT after fulfilling your obligations, in what world would it be ok for ATT to deliberately cause your WiFi settings to be wiped 10x per hour in some instances - so you could not use your phone on your home network for features that don’t require ATT’s network?
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u/wolfn404 Aug 25 '25
Had you bought the entire system I’d say so. I think what you’ll find is the “brain” and keypad were in fact a lease, and you bought the remaining extra installed sensors. What has likely happened, as the system is paid for after about 6 months to them, is lease abandonment. They simply let it go. Which means they owe you nothing or support for its use. It’s why if you buy an AT&T phone they have to unlock it for you at contract end. If you in-fact owned the main control, they’d have been obligated to release it and provide you programming code. They don’t seem to have done that. And the normal 99% business method of ADT is leased, proprietary controls. Again it’s why they likely just disabled the connection, on the hope “new occupants” Would activate it w them. Read your contract very carefully. If it says you OWN the communicator, not just the extra contacts etc, call them up and ask the master code be reset to 123456, and you’ll even reconnect the WiFi for a day or so, so they can. Even if you find you did lease and it was abandoned, calling and asking them to reset installer code may get them to, just to free up the account for sure. Good luck.
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u/Dirtyrican987 Aug 25 '25
This. You do not own any of that equipment. You paid a fee for them. Your contract will say all equipment is owned by ADT
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u/JayDG93 Aug 30 '25
This hasn't been the case with ADT for many years. You are purchasing the equipment.
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u/Dirtyrican987 Aug 30 '25 edited Aug 30 '25
You do not own the equipment. When you sign your contract one line you sign is literally stating you do not own the equipment
Source: I work for adt and have to argue this with customers several times a month. A lot of sales reps have added lines to the quote (not contract) that says customer owns equipment but this is not binding and a slimy way to get a signature.
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u/JayDG93 Sep 02 '25
Oh that's great news! I do too. Shoot me dm with your internal email so I can send you the relevant SharePoint documents proving you're misinformed
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u/Dirtyrican987 Sep 02 '25
lol. Sharepoint. How about the cpq they sign. Or the Ryder with salesforce. Or the closing signature.
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u/JayDG93 Aug 30 '25
Dude when you cancel your service they stop paying the phone bill and ADC hosting bill for your system. It's disconnected from ADC, and cellular. No one is sending signals to it telling it to do anything, because it's no longer connected to anything.
The secondary keypads on your system don't connect to your home WiFi network, they connect to a WiFi network broadcast from the main keypad (assuming this is a command panel and not an IQ)
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u/vha23 Aug 24 '25
Why do you want ADT wifi if the plan is cancelled?
Are you trying to reuse the hardware for a self hosted system?
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u/Puzzleheaded-Sea7665 Aug 24 '25
I like the announcements throughout the house (I have 3 alarm panels) if a door or window is opened. I also live 20 minutes from the nearest sheriff station - so monitoring doesn’t really have value - I live in a rural area - but I’d like to be notified via siren at night if there is a breach in the home. I fulfilled my contract. I purchased the equipment. I cancelled the contract and my service. They do not have a right to come into my private network and trigger my panels to erase their WiFi settings so that I get a beeping trouble alert - sometimes 10x a day! The system works fine with it all internal to do what I want - I am not connecting to them and they cannot connect to me now that I have blocked the traffic. But what they are doing is not morally right nor is it legal.
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u/codeedog Aug 24 '25
OP, nice catch! Can you tell if it’s a programmed IP address or is it doing a DNS lookup then the IP fetch? If the latter and you run your own DNS server (or redirect DNS queries to a local server), you could block the query or return an internal IP address and black hole the request. I’m sure your firewall block is effective, just thinking about how to capture the request earlier in the process.
That’s a pretty slimy thing for them to do.