Insteon may have abruptly ceased operations leaving its smart home customers in the literal dark.
Three days ago users started noticing their Insteon smart hubs had lost connection to the cloud. Integrations with assistants like Alexa stopped working and it was no longer possible to sign in via the app to control devices. The hub itself shows a red light indicating something is wrong.
If you go to Insteon's forums to look for help, those are down. As are the forums for smarthome.com. If you try to call their phone number, you get a busy signal. There's also no response from customer support online or via email.
While the main website is still up, the Insteon leadership page leads to a 404 error. There are even unconfirmed rumors that Insteon's offices at 1621 Alton Pkwy, Irvine, CA have been emptied.
I was near Insteon’s headquarters in Irvine where they have a customer facing storefront (where I bought most of my equipment). Upon opening their door, which oddly had the signage removed, I was surprised to see the entire place gutted! It was a ghost town. I walked through all the hallways and every room was stripped to the walls — no people, no desks, no equipment, nothing. I found a fellow tenant in the building who told me they shut down and cleared out everything last Friday (April 8).
Another user posted exterior photos from the same building on Saturday, indicating it was locked up despite being within posted operating hours. No signage is visible on the door.
Wholesale suppliers have already informed business customers to look to other solutions to get Insteon networks back up and running. Hardware options include ISY99, ISY994, Hometroller, and Polisy; however, some configurations require a PLM which Insteon stopped making a while back. Software options include OpenHAB, Home Assistant, and Homebridge. These new configurations will be more complicated to set up; however, they are actually more powerful.
Important Note: Home Assistant is warning potential users not to factory reset their Insteon hubs.
The Insteon company has shut down and turned off their cloud as of April 2022. Do not factory reset your device under any circumstances as it will not be recoverable.
Some users who already reset their hubs while troubleshooting report being able to access the hub with the default username and password that is printed on it; however, changing login info or network settings is no longer possible.
Unfortunately, despite Insteon's reliable home automation technology that uses both existing wires (power line) and radio frequency communication, the company failed to capitalize on the growth of the smart home market. Sadly, it appears as though the company's days may be numbered and worse, its customers left in the lurch.
You can check out the Insteon subreddit and download the iClarified app or follow iClarified on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and RSS for updates.
Three days ago users started noticing their Insteon smart hubs had lost connection to the cloud. Integrations with assistants like Alexa stopped working and it was no longer possible to sign in via the app to control devices. The hub itself shows a red light indicating something is wrong.
If you go to Insteon's forums to look for help, those are down. As are the forums for smarthome.com. If you try to call their phone number, you get a busy signal. There's also no response from customer support online or via email.
While the main website is still up, the Insteon leadership page leads to a 404 error. There are even unconfirmed rumors that Insteon's offices at 1621 Alton Pkwy, Irvine, CA have been emptied.
I was near Insteon’s headquarters in Irvine where they have a customer facing storefront (where I bought most of my equipment). Upon opening their door, which oddly had the signage removed, I was surprised to see the entire place gutted! It was a ghost town. I walked through all the hallways and every room was stripped to the walls — no people, no desks, no equipment, nothing. I found a fellow tenant in the building who told me they shut down and cleared out everything last Friday (April 8).
Another user posted exterior photos from the same building on Saturday, indicating it was locked up despite being within posted operating hours. No signage is visible on the door.
Wholesale suppliers have already informed business customers to look to other solutions to get Insteon networks back up and running. Hardware options include ISY99, ISY994, Hometroller, and Polisy; however, some configurations require a PLM which Insteon stopped making a while back. Software options include OpenHAB, Home Assistant, and Homebridge. These new configurations will be more complicated to set up; however, they are actually more powerful.
Important Note: Home Assistant is warning potential users not to factory reset their Insteon hubs.
The Insteon company has shut down and turned off their cloud as of April 2022. Do not factory reset your device under any circumstances as it will not be recoverable.
Some users who already reset their hubs while troubleshooting report being able to access the hub with the default username and password that is printed on it; however, changing login info or network settings is no longer possible.
Unfortunately, despite Insteon's reliable home automation technology that uses both existing wires (power line) and radio frequency communication, the company failed to capitalize on the growth of the smart home market. Sadly, it appears as though the company's days may be numbered and worse, its customers left in the lurch.
You can check out the Insteon subreddit and download the iClarified app or follow iClarified on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and RSS for updates.