Amazon is Providing Your Private Ring Doorbell Footage to Police
Documents released last week suggest video footage collected by Amazon Ring devices is being recorded and provided to law enforcement. Such footage was provided to police at least 11 times in 2022 without users’ consent.
Ring is a doorbell camera that offers peace of mind by collecting videos outside a user’s home. According to Strategy Analytics, nearly 16% of American households – that’s over 20 million homes – utilize video doorbells as part of their home security systems.
The relationship between Ring and law enforcement was exposed last week by Senator Edward Markey (D-MA), who received a letter from Amazon in response to his questions.
Amazon officials claim they were simply following the law during a handful of emergency situations, but did not specify the extent to which Ring can capture audio. “Ring made a good-faith determination that there was an imminent danger of death or serious physical injury to a person requiring disclosure of information without delay,” wrote Amazon Executive Brian Huseman.
While this may be true, the implications for abuse are worth considering.
“Increasing law enforcement reliance on private surveillance creates a crisis of accountability,” warned Markey, who expressed concerns that Amazon may start to use biometric data (body measurements and other calculations related to human characteristics) in its systems.
Markey is among a group of lawmakers supporting a bill designed to restrict law enforcement’s access to this kind of information.
Author’s Note: What this means is that if you use a Ring device you are essentially installing a spy camera on yourself.
Editor’s Note: It goes to show that you cannot trust big tech, they do not give a rat’s ass about your privacy. Eventually they will be mining that video to sell you crap, or as in this case, they will report you to the police if they see you posting Trump signs in your lawn.
Source:
Amazon.com’s Ring gave police data without user consent 11 times in 2022
Wow! Just another political avenue to spread fear! What is meant as a good gesture and to help in an emergency is always perverted to induce the worst that can happen! What about the life alert devices? Are “they” spying through them? Wow!
It’s all good. Alice thinks we should know this. We can’t trust anyone anymore
Good story Alice. It’s pretty shocking given a warrant was not needed. That is an Amazon process issue and I think it’s totally wrong. They should demand a warrant.
They say they are complying with the law, but unless it’s an emergency at a level that would forego the need of a warrant, and those are very hard to imagine, it’s just wrong. Plus, I have yet to see where my cameras would stop or allow law-enforcement to get there in time to stop any emergency that’s ongoing. Basically it’s just a heads up and an audit trail after the fact.
Amazon, with its blink system, is even worse in that even though Blink will allow you to store locally, in order to use the product effectively you must subscribe to the cloud.
Or worse, many of these systems allow indoor cameras as well. I really could care less what clips they steal from my doorbell or outside cameras, but one of my inside cameras is catching a doorway in my garage where I often change into my bathing suit. That’s a picture that no one should see. Ever. Oh well, I guess it’s another teachable moment for me to know when to turn the cameras off.
I agree Alice this is very wrong,
Who made you a lawyer?
WAD u r.
Got any issues related comments or even a cogent idea? Crickets