Andy Kunz wrote:
>
> >does what it's designed to do.
>
> That was my point.  The other is that, regardless of the wavelength, there
> was still a lot of energy received by tthe ciruit.


The laser pointer energy never made it to the detector. The filter is
optical, and in front of the detector (in many cases built right into
the case of the sensor element)

Had you illuminated it with energy in the filter's passband, then that
would have been relevant.
They work indoors, because there are not a lot of sources with
significant energy in that band, and even fewer that are modulated at a
rate that will get past the electronic filter.