Best ways to protect your home against criminals

South Africans are under a constant threat of violent crime in their homes, and must take appropriate measures to protect themselves and their families.

This is according to security expert Albert Smit, who was interviewed on the Kragdag YouTube channel.

Smit’s beliefs are backed up by South Africa’s official crime data.

According to South Africa’s quarterly statistics, there were over 4,500 recorded residential robberies nationally in the first three months of 2026 alone.

The number of nationally recorded residential burglaries – house break-ins where the occupants are away – was even higher at 35,348.

However, these figures only account for recorded incidents, and non-recorded incidents are believed to be exponentially larger in number.

The Victims of Crime Survey data shows actual housebreaking levels are typically 3-5 times higher than SAPS-reported figures.

Furthermore, according to the latest Stats SA survey, an estimated 1.5 million incidents of housebreaking occurred during the 2024/25 year, which represents 5.7% of all households in South Africa.

How to protect your home

Smit highlighted that many people’s nightmares are waking up in the middle of the night to an intruder, particularly an armed one.

According to Smit, there is a universal approach that makes sense to deter and defend against such attacks: make yourself a hardened target.

This refers to having many different layers of security, thereby making your home particularly hard and unattractive for a criminal to target.

He highlights the importance of a safe zone – a room that may be safer than others, which can be secured if someone were to invade your home.

This gives you more time to hide or stay safe until help arrives.

Before someone enters your home, however, you must make it as difficult as possible for them to get in.

Smit said that if you do not have burglar bars on your windows in South Africa, you are being irresponsible.

Burglar bars will either keep criminals out, or at the very least force them to make enough noise breaking through them to wake you up.

Lighting is another key consideration – and one where homes commonly make mistakes.

Smit explained that mast lights are the wrong approach to safety. While they let you see what is going on outside, they do not serve as a deterrent to the criminal.

Rather, Smit explained, if you lower your security lights to human height, you can effectively blind the criminal as they are approaching.

Furthermore, you can see the criminal, but because the light does not illuminate you, you are not nearly as visible to him.

Smit also shared the importance of a perimeter alarm or an early warning system of some kind.

This can be a commercial-grade device, a trip-wire connected to percussion caps, or something as simple as fishing line and an empty tin, hanging on your front door.

“It will have two immediate consequences: The first is that he no longer has the element of surprise on his side, and you have woken up,” explained Smit.

“And he knows you have potentially woken up, so immediately, you change the scenario.”