Know what's happening within 2km of your door
Neighbours within about 2km of you — not a whole postal district. Hear about the break-in on the next road, the missing dog, the car being tried, from the people it happened to, not from a rumour three weeks later.
Check your area first
See how many neighbours are already on Patrol where you live — before you give us anything. No account, no email.
- Members with confirmed accounts, placed on their own road — not a whole postal district
- Your location is rounded to ~100m and never shown to anyone
- Free, with nothing on sale and no card
Patrol is not an emergency service and is not the Gardaí. In an emergency ring 999 or 112.
- Break-ins
- Cars being tried
- Missing pets
- Vans checking driveways
- Doorstep & phone scams
- Found keys & wallets
- Road hazards
- Power & water outages
- Anti-social behaviour
- Community notices
Every alert, the same useful shape
What happened, roughly where, roughly when, what to do. No names, no plates, no shouting — the report form is built to refuse them.
What happened
A category and a plain account — what they saw, not who they think did it.
Roughly where
An area in their own words, like “near the estate green”. Never an address.
Roughly when
So you know if it’s tonight’s problem or last week’s.
From a confirmed member nearby
First name and last initial. Email confirmed, placed on their own road inside your 2km.
Every alert is labelled a community report — one neighbour's account, never presented as official. How reports are moderated →
Live in two minutes. Useful at ten doors.
- 01
Eircode, then tap your road
We round the tap to ~100m. No address, ever.
- 02
Confirm your email
Name, email, password. Nobody posts unverified.
- 03
Your 2km switches on
Alerts from about a twenty-minute walk around you.
- 04
Bring ten doors
One message to the estate group. Density is the product.
households is where it starts working
No cameras, no sensors — the people on it are the whole product. An alert reaches everyone signed up inside your 2km and nobody outside it, so one member on a road is writing to themselves.
Residents' association or community group? Get one link for your whole estate.
- Someone posts
- Neighbours who get it
- Too far — same town, not their street
What other people can see about you
Less than you'd think. Here it is, in full.
Never your address
You tap roughly where you live. We snap it to a ~100m square before storing it — a stretch of road, not a house — and never show it to anyone.
A name, not a profile
First name and last initial on posts. No directory, no browsing members, no cold messages.
Nothing public
Only verified members in the area see alerts. Nothing indexed, nothing on this page.
No naming, no accusations
Posts that name a person, show a plate or accuse anyone are removed.
Report and block
Flag any alert in one tap. False reports and harassment cost the account.
Leave completely
Delete from your dashboard. Account and posts are erased, not archived.
Asked before joining
Including the awkward ones. Anything else, a person answers hello@patrol.ie.
Full FAQIs Patrol free?
Yes — completely, with no card and no paid tier. There is nothing on sale on this site today. If that ever changes, the change will be announced rather than discovered.
Why do you need my Eircode, and why the map?
The Eircode tells us your town or postal district — we read only the first three characters, and the four that identify your specific house are never used to locate you.
But a postal district is not a neighbourhood. A Dublin postal district runs to tens of thousands of households, and a safety feed covering all of it is a local newspaper. So after the Eircode we ask you to tap roughly where you live, and your alerts come from about 2km around that point instead.
Eircode itself can't narrow it: the characters after the routing key are deliberately randomised, precisely so location can't be inferred from them. Asking you is the only way that doesn't involve buying a copy of the national address database.
Can other members see where I live?
No. Patrol never asks for an address and never stores one. The point you tap is rounded to about 100 metres before it is saved — so what exists in the database is a stretch of road, not a house — and it is never shown to another member. Alerts carry the area you describe in your own words, plus a first name and last initial.
Is Patrol connected to An Garda Síochána?
No. Patrol is independent, has no Garda relationship, and posting here does not report anything to anybody official. Report crime to your local Garda station, or the Garda Confidential Line on 1800 666 111.
What should I do in an emergency?
Ring 999 or 112. Patrol is not monitored — nobody is reading it on your behalf, at any hour. It is for telling neighbours things after the fact, not for getting help now.
Can I stay anonymous?
Not to your neighbours. Alerts carry your first name and last initial, because a neighbourhood watch where anyone can post anything unattributed becomes a rumour mill very quickly. You are anonymous to the public internet: nothing you post is visible without a verified account in the area.
What can I not post?
Names, addresses, registration plates, photos of identifiable people, or accusations against an individual. Report what you saw, not who you think did it. Reports that identify or accuse a person are removed, and the account that posted them can be removed too.
Can I delete my account?
Yes, from your dashboard, in two clicks, without emailing anyone. Your account and everything you posted are deleted from the database — not hidden, not deactivated.
How is this different from our estate WhatsApp group?
WhatsApp is better for conversation, and if your group is working, keep it. Patrol does the parts a group chat is bad at: everyone in the area is reachable without knowing them or having their number, reports have a consistent shape you can act on, and a message from three months ago is still findable.
Plenty of areas will sensibly use both.
Switch on your 2km
Check your area, then send it to the people on your road — that's how every working area on Patrol got there.
Ten doors is a neighbourhood watch
An alert reaches the people signed up nearby, so one person on a road reaches nobody. It starts being useful at around 10 households — which is one message to a group you're already in, not a campaign.
What to do next
Picked for what you just worked out — not a list of everything we make.