Clue 1 · The Basics
U.S. security services company · large-cap · listed on the NYSE · headquartered in Florida.
Clue 2 · The Numbers
Monitors roughly 6 million customers across the country, pulling in about $5 billion a year — mostly from recurring monthly fees rather than one-time sales.
Clue 3 · The History
Traces its roots all the way back to 1874, when it started as a telegraph-based alert network — basically the 19th-century version of a panic button.
Clue 4 · The Secret
Despite guarding everyone else's stuff, it has changed corporate ownership more times than most people change their alarm codes — spun off, merged, and reborn multiple times over the decades.
Clue 5 · The Lore
Those yard signs and window stickers it plants at homes are considered so effective at deterring burglars that they're practically a product in their own right.
Clue 6 · The Giveaway
That blue hexagon sign in your neighbor's front yard, the three-letter ticker that doubles as a distress call, and the company that answers when your alarm goes off at 3 a.m.