For nearly 150 years, ADT has been synonymous with home security — the yard signs, the keypads, the monitoring centers staffed around the clock. But the company’s latest move signals a dramatic rethinking of what home protection looks like in the wireless age. ADT is partnering with Origin Wireless AI to deploy a technology that turns ordinary Wi-Fi signals into a motion-detection system, effectively transforming every router into a silent, invisible sentry.
The partnership, announced in late June 2025, introduces what ADT is calling ADT Wi-Fi Motion Sensing, a system built on Origin Wireless AI’s platform that analyzes disruptions in Wi-Fi radio waves to detect movement, presence, and even breathing patterns inside a home — all without cameras, wearables, or traditional motion sensors. According to The Verge, the technology works by monitoring how Wi-Fi signals bounce between a router and connected devices. When a person moves through a room, those signals are disturbed in predictable, measurable ways, allowing the system to infer motion, location, and even vital signs.
The Science Behind the Signal
Wi-Fi sensing is not entirely new as a concept. Researchers at MIT and other institutions have been experimenting with radio-frequency-based motion detection for over a decade. But commercializing the technology at scale — and making it reliable enough for a security application — has proven difficult. Origin Wireless AI, a Maryland-based company spun out of research at the University of Maryland, claims to have cracked the problem. The company holds more than 200 patents related to Wi-Fi sensing and has developed AI models that can distinguish between a pet walking across a room, a ceiling fan spinning, and a human intruder.
The system requires compatible Wi-Fi hardware, and ADT plans to integrate the technology into its existing smart home offerings. As reported by The Verge, the initial rollout will focus on whole-home presence detection — knowing whether someone is home, which rooms are occupied, and whether there is unexpected movement during armed-away periods. Over time, ADT and Origin plan to add health monitoring features, including fall detection and sleep tracking, capabilities that could position the system as a tool for aging-in-place applications.
Why ADT Needs a New Playbook
ADT’s interest in Wi-Fi sensing reflects broader pressures facing the traditional home security industry. The company has watched as tech giants like Amazon (through Ring and Blink), Google (through Nest), and Apple (through HomeKit) have eaten into the do-it-yourself security market with affordable cameras, sensors, and smart locks. Meanwhile, professional monitoring subscriptions — long the bread and butter of ADT’s business model — face skepticism from younger homeowners who prefer app-based alerts and self-monitoring.
The company’s stock has been under pressure, and its 2024 partnership with State Farm to bundle security monitoring with homeowner’s insurance signaled a willingness to explore unconventional revenue streams. Wi-Fi sensing represents another such bet: a way to offer whole-home awareness without the installation complexity and hardware costs of traditional sensor networks. A single router and a few Wi-Fi access points could theoretically replace dozens of individual motion detectors, door sensors, and cameras — a compelling value proposition for both ADT and its customers.
Origin Wireless AI’s Long Road to Market
Origin Wireless AI was founded in 2013 by Dr. Ray Liu, a distinguished professor at the University of Maryland’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Liu’s academic work focused on time-reversal technology — a method of analyzing how radio waves propagate through complex environments by essentially “replaying” their paths. This foundational research became the backbone of Origin’s commercial platform.
The company has previously worked with telecom providers and hardware manufacturers to embed Wi-Fi sensing into routers and mesh networking systems. But the ADT partnership represents its highest-profile deal to date and its most direct entry into the consumer security market. According to Origin’s published materials, its platform can be deployed as a software update on compatible chipsets from major manufacturers including Qualcomm and MediaTek, meaning that in many cases, existing hardware can be upgraded without physical replacement.
Privacy Questions Loom Large
Any technology that can detect human presence and movement through walls raises immediate privacy concerns. Wi-Fi sensing does not capture images or audio, which its proponents argue makes it inherently more privacy-friendly than cameras. But the granularity of the data it collects — who is in which room, when they arrived, how long they stayed, whether they are sleeping or awake — creates a detailed behavioral profile that could be valuable to advertisers, insurers, or bad actors if improperly secured or shared.
ADT has said that data from the Wi-Fi sensing system will be processed locally on the home network where possible and that the company will adhere to its existing privacy policies. But privacy advocates have noted that ADT’s terms of service already permit broad data collection and sharing with third parties for marketing purposes. The Electronic Frontier Foundation and similar organizations have not yet issued formal statements on ADT’s Wi-Fi sensing product specifically, but they have previously raised alarms about ambient sensing technologies that operate passively and continuously without clear user consent mechanisms beyond the initial setup.
The Competitive Field Is Getting Crowded
ADT is not the only company eyeing Wi-Fi sensing for home applications. Amazon has been quietly developing similar capabilities for its Eero mesh router line, with patents filed as recently as 2024 describing motion detection and presence sensing through Wi-Fi signal analysis. Cognitive Systems, a Canadian company, has licensed its Wi-Fi motion technology to several internet service providers, including Plume and some Comcast Xfinity deployments. And Qualcomm itself has built Wi-Fi sensing capabilities into its latest networking chipsets, making the technology available to any hardware manufacturer willing to write the software.
What distinguishes ADT’s approach is the professional monitoring layer. While a standalone Wi-Fi sensing system from a router manufacturer might send an alert to a homeowner’s phone, ADT’s version would feed into the company’s 24/7 monitoring infrastructure, potentially triggering a call from a human operator or an automated dispatch to local emergency services. This integration is where ADT believes it can differentiate itself from the growing crowd of tech companies dabbling in ambient sensing. The question is whether consumers will pay a monthly subscription fee for a service built on technology that their router might soon offer for free.
Health Monitoring: The Bigger Prize
Industry analysts suggest that the long-term value of Wi-Fi sensing may lie less in security than in health and wellness monitoring. The ability to detect falls, track sleep patterns, and monitor breathing rates without wearable devices is particularly attractive for the elderly care market, where compliance with wearable devices is notoriously low. A system that works passively — requiring no action from the person being monitored — could be a significant improvement over medical alert pendants and smartwatches that must be charged and worn consistently.
ADT has signaled interest in this direction. The company’s existing ADT Health division already offers medical alert systems and remote patient monitoring services. Integrating Wi-Fi sensing into these offerings could allow ADT to provide continuous, non-intrusive health monitoring as an add-on to its security packages, creating a bundled service aimed at adult children managing care for aging parents. According to The Verge, Origin Wireless AI’s platform already supports respiration monitoring and fall detection in controlled environments, though the accuracy of these features in real-world home settings with multiple occupants, pets, and environmental variables remains to be independently validated.
What Comes Next for ADT and the Industry
ADT plans to begin rolling out Wi-Fi Motion Sensing to select markets in the second half of 2025, with broader availability expected in 2026. Pricing details have not been disclosed, but the company has indicated that the feature will be available as part of its premium smart home packages and may require compatible mesh Wi-Fi hardware provided or sold by ADT.
For the home security industry at large, the move represents a broader shift toward ambient intelligence — systems that understand what is happening inside a home without relying on discrete, visible sensors. Whether this shift ultimately benefits consumers will depend on how companies like ADT handle the thorny questions of data ownership, algorithmic transparency, and the fine line between a home that protects you and one that watches you. The technology is ready. The trust, as always, will take longer to build.