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Amazon's Ring Police Portal For Mass Surveillance

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Re: Amazon's Ring Police Portal For Mass Surveillance

#141

Post by reaperducer »

chaostheory wrote: post #97
_r3e4 wrote: post #2

I found this dropbox link to Ring's marketing video for Police Departments to use their smart video cameras for mass surveillance. This was made before Amazon acquired them. At the end of the demo the CEO states that their facial recognition search feature will be available soon. This software is made in Ukraine and the hardware is manufactured in China. There was no private company contract bid - Ring is just giving…

I'm a Ring customer. The Ring Portal is optional and opt-in. People want this. This is similar but not the same as Yc's Flock https://www.flocksafety.com/ but it doesn't require a home owner's association to set up and it's inexpensive. (Flock focuses on storing license plates.) Stuff like this helps police do something about robberies and burglaries. It's harder to ignore and file away when there's video evidence. M…

I'm a Ring customer. The Ring Portal is optional and opt-in.

I'm not a Ring owner, but several of my neighbors are. Two have told me that they have been pressured by police officers — in person — to join some kind of surveillance program. I'm not sure if it's this one, or something else.

I also don't know how the cops found out that they had Ring devices, but the local PD advocates for it heavily on my neighborhood's Nextdoor group.

Re: Amazon's Ring Police Portal For Mass Surveillance

#142

Post by zyren »

_r3e4 wrote: post #2

I found this dropbox link to Ring's marketing video for Police Departments to use their smart video cameras for mass surveillance. This was made before Amazon acquired them. At the end of the demo the CEO states that their facial recognition search feature will be available soon. This software is made in Ukraine and the hardware is manufactured in China. There was no private company contract bid - Ring is just giving…

do you have a mirror to this? video has been taken down.

Re: Amazon's Ring Police Portal For Mass Surveillance

#143

Post by reaperducer »

fixermark wrote: post #16
_r3e4 wrote: post #2

I found this dropbox link to Ring's marketing video for Police Departments to use their smart video cameras for mass surveillance. This was made before Amazon acquired them. At the end of the demo the CEO states that their facial recognition search feature will be available soon. This software is made in Ukraine and the hardware is manufactured in China. There was no private company contract bid - Ring is just giving…

> Ring is just giving this to cops for free and offering customers a discount for letting their video surveillance from their home / doorbell be shared with the police in this portal That's a hell of a market strategy. Do you have a source on that discount story? Because I'm not able to find one right now.

Do you have a source on that discount story? Because I'm not able to find one right now.

Not the OP, but my neighborhood's Nextdoor message board is filled with both Ring discounts, and pleas from the local PD for people to buy them. I have no proof that they're related, but if the marketing is being done through hyper-targeted methods like this, it might explain why it's not Googleable.

Re: Amazon's Ring Police Portal For Mass Surveillance

#144

Post by reaperducer »

ryanmarsh wrote: post #112
joering2 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no encryption. There is no 2FA. There is no legal protection for privacy of citizens face's caught in these cameras and added to their facial recognition algorithms. Yes and no lawsuit will be won either. Every judge will strike it based on being in public assumption of lack of privacy. If you walk on public street, don't assume your privacy is protected :(

If you walk on public street No, this is not public property, it's if you walk on private property . Ring cams are placed on private property and are targeted at homeowners. They usually don't record or activate outside of a range of 30 feet or so. So if someone drives by my house the ring cam doesn't capture it but if someone walks by my door it does.

They usually don't record or activate outside of a range of 30 feet or so.

The Ring videos my neighbors post show their yards, the sidewalk, and all the way to the cars on the other side of the street.

It seems to be all about how your doorbell is positioned, though.

Re: Amazon's Ring Police Portal For Mass Surveillance

#145

Post by reaperducer »

ndespres wrote: post #87

I can not imagine developing this and thinking that it is Good. This type of product and platform completely ignores the reality of how it will be used and how police behave in American society. In the demo video, their example has someone sharing a photo of "suspicious people" walking around outside their house, and has neighbors commenting "oh no!" on it. Now the police are alerted to this "crime" which may not eve…

Anyone who has an account on NextDoor knows the hysteria around a minor event like a car that someone doesn't recognize being in the neighborhood.

Happened to me. I saw myself in a Nextdoor video as someone "suspicious," followed pleas from the homeowner and a chorus of cabbageheads for more videos from anyone living nearby so they could identify the car I drive.

That's what I get for walking through a public park that backs into a group of homes two hours before closing time.

The level of paranoia in the suburbs is just off the charts. I can't wait until I can move back to a city like New York or Chicago or Houston, where I can be safe from my neighbors, and only have to worry about the criminals.

Re: Amazon's Ring Police Portal For Mass Surveillance

#146

Post by reaperducer »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #83
sitkack wrote: post #77

Nice, efficient, low-friction slide into fascism.

A ring for every room citizen.

After all, if you've got nothing to hide, why wouldn't you let the police watch a video feed from inside your house?

You don't have anything to hide, do you, citizen?

/s

Re: Amazon's Ring Police Portal For Mass Surveillance

#147

Post by reaperducer »

openasocket wrote: post #91
happyringuser wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is MA. Unlike nearly everywhere in the US, the state does not have the common-sense exemptions for "you should have known you were being recorded because [you were on a public street|you should have seen the sticker on my window]". See Commonwealth v. Jackson, 370 Mass. 502 (1976), saying that the MGL 272 sec 99 prohibition on "secret" recording is so broad that it is possible to "secretly" record someone even i…

Ah, I didn't know MA didn't have an exemption for public locations.

I don't think IL does, either. It's why when local TV stations do undercover stories, it's always video only — no audio.

Re: Amazon's Ring Police Portal For Mass Surveillance

#148

Post by CamperBob2 »

dragonwriter wrote: post #133
CamperBob2 wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then why am I paying their salaries?

> Then why am I paying their salaries? You, individually, are not. Your shared interests with those with whom you are are collectively doing so are, obviously, not coextensive with all of your personal interests, but are a subset of them. Law enforcement serves (ideally) diffuse public interests, acute private interests are served (in the legal realm) by private civil litigation. Particularly, you (individually, and…

I'll be sure to remember this noble policesplaining explanation the next time a bond issue or tax bill comes up. Paying for the private administration of justice is not how things are supposed to work in this country.

Re: Amazon's Ring Police Portal For Mass Surveillance

#149

Post by will_brown »

dragonwriter wrote: post #136
will_brown wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well I did serve Footlocker notice under Florida Civil Statute to preserve the video and confirmed with the store manager the video exists and the events occurred at that store location. Before I spend a few hundred dollars more on filing a civil suit just to serve discovery on footlocker, I’d go straight to the store and pay the manager to make me a copy (save myself time and money). Either way filing a civil suit o…

> Before I spend a few hundred dollars more on filing a civil suit just to serve discovery on footlocker, I’d go straight to the store and pay the manager to make me a copy (save myself time and money). The manager may be prohibited by policy from taking money for that purpose, and it's not exactly going to remain a secret, so the cost may not be a savings if the manager sets the bribe at a level sufficient to adequs…

>Sure, we'd all prefer a public subsidy of litigation costs, but public law enforcement doesn't have infinite resources, so not every loss, even where a crime is involved, is going to have public resources expended on it.

What in the hell are you talking about? Your big takeaway from this conversation is what I would like and other who were victims of crimes where in this thread is that what we want is Subsidize our litigation costs?

Im the victim of a crime, the majority of criminal courts have power to order restitution for a reason...it’s not to subsidize litigation, it’s efficiency of the courts and it actually is a savings for tax payer money. Why pay for a civil and criminal case instead of 1 where things may be resolved globally?

Yes, resources are limited not every crime will be solved. That’s a great political response, it kindly ignores the specific facts of this case, where there is video evidence of grand theft and credit card fraud, but the police won’t muster the energy to write an email to request it. If we don’t have have the resources to email a request for a video (which I believe they do), then a public platform to conduct crowdsourced investigations by the public is more warranted than even I originally believed.

As one lawyer o another, I hope your not the victim of a felony some day and the response from fellow man (or lawyer) isn’t...police don’t have resources to investigate your case, stop trying to subsidize your civil litigation costs, that’s what suing John Doe is for.

Re: Amazon's Ring Police Portal For Mass Surveillance

#150

Post by chaostheory »

kakarot wrote: post #134
chaostheory wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a Ring customer. The Ring Portal is optional and opt-in. People want this. This is similar but not the same as Yc's Flock https://www.flocksafety.com/ but it doesn't require a home owner's association to set up and it's inexpensive. (Flock focuses on storing license plates.) Stuff like this helps police do something about robberies and burglaries. It's harder to ignore and file away when there's video evidence. M…

> The only real way to completely escape it, is to avoid technology and live outside of large metros; away from civilization This is an incredibly subservient, defeatist attitude. I do not allow devices like Alexa into my home. I do not own a smart TV. Besides studio recording equipment, the only microphone in my house is on my phone. If I have my own cameras, and a burglary takes place, I will share that part of the…

> This is an incredibly subservient, defeatist attitude.

It's reality if you use a smart phone or own a tablet, or are around others that do. Do your friends and family own one? Do you not own and use a smart phone? You know the device that tracks your location and pushes your data to the cloud. Pretending that doesn't exist is just another instance of cognitive dissonance. Besides what happens when people take a picture of you? They post it to the cloud along with datetime and location data, and even names.

A lot of people who value convenience above all do not realize what they are trading it for. Many of these people don't even realize that's what they value most. It's hard not to be in that category if you use almost any kind of cloud connected service. I'm only making blissfully ignorant people aware of it. Maybe you should reexamine the digital aspect of your own life before strongly judging me.

> I do not allow devices like Alexa into my home.

What about Siri, Google, or Kortana? Siri is on both iPhones and Macs now. Kortana is on every Win 10 machine. Google Assistant / Ok Google is on Chrome OS and Android.

Do you own any IoT device? Even if they don't have a mic or camera, they can still track you and your habits.

> "He who would trade liberty for some temporary security, deserves neither liberty nor security."

I'm not sure how I've traded my liberty on this one. It's not like I voted for a Patriot Act, where I don't have a choice on what I'm willing to share.

> Letting them just hook in is positively insane. If I have my own cameras, and a burglary takes place, I will share that part of the video with the local police.

They don't "hook in". It's just NextDoor for Ring owners where it's easier to share video with other Ring owners and now police. You CAN pick and choose what you want to share on Ring Neighborhood. That's how it works. Again no one is forced to even join Ring Neighborhood and you pick and choose what you want to share. Most importantly, even after you join - you can opt out at anytime.

People now have a better chance of getting police to deal with people who steal their packages.

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