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Amazon’s Disturbing Plan to Add Face Surveillance to Your Front Door

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Re: Amazon’s Disturbing Plan to Add Face Surveillance to Your Front Door

#101

Post by _37go »

bluetidepro wrote: post #13

"Amazon’s Disturbing Plan..."? Come on. I agree this is scary and "disturbing", but doorbell cameras have been around for awhile. It's not like Amazon is the first to do this. Phrasing like that always makes me immediately distrust the article's intent, even if at face value what they are saying is something I agree about. Just because they are openly saying it in a patent, doesn't mean the other companies weren't al…

it's ring, not amazon. no other consumer hardware iOt company is providing facial recognition id search to police via products camera. Their employees are given shirts that say 'fuck crime' but the only victim in amazon package theft crime is amazon, customers are refunded.

Re: Amazon’s Disturbing Plan to Add Face Surveillance to Your Front Door

#102

Post by _37go »

helloworld2212 wrote: post #29

I'm quite surprised here to not have seen anyone point out the way these patent games typically work inside of a big company. Often a company is motivated to increase their IP portfolio. In turn they motivate their engineers by offering lucrative bonuses for each patent filed. At my last company we played this game and it was roughly $3k per patent. In general, out of the huge number of patents that get filed in a bi…

it's already deployed. Ring has the best facial recognition team is Eastern Europe. it's shitty software but amazon's working on integrating rekognition with ring's own tech. over 80 police departments currently use the product to track 'suspicious people' as flagged by users or their AI.

https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/evkgpw/smart-door...

Re: Amazon’s Disturbing Plan to Add Face Surveillance to Your Front Door

#104

Post by mosselman »

JohnFen wrote: post #40
SubiculumCode wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't buy a door bell camera, discourage your neighbors from doing so. Tell them you think the whole thing is crass.

I think "crass" is understating it. "Invasive and antisocial" seems closer.

I agree, but the layman is just upset that he can’t have his cool gadget, so you need to soften them up a little to your views first I guess.

Re: Amazon’s Disturbing Plan to Add Face Surveillance to Your Front Door

#105

Post by laumars »

dvtrn wrote: post #52
laumars wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While that is a valid concern about the abuse of such technology, I couldn't see that ever happening if just because it would generate far too many false positives to render the technology useful (not to mention that most police forces in the world are under funded so they're not going to be the slightest bit interested in people walking past a house). This kind of alerting is a bit like any of the automated alarms w…

I can see how members of some communities might feel like the technology opens them up to more scrutiny than they probably deserve from an overzealous do-gooder (or busybody, depending on your perspective). Even if statistically the likelihood is low, I wouldn't say the fears of what this technology enables and could result in for someone simply being in the wrong neighborhood 'while black' are overly complicated or…

Like I said, I agree it’s a valid concern. My point was that for this kind of tech to be useful, it wouldn’t want to be that zealous with alerting otherwise the system would get flooded with false positives. That means door to door sales people, preachers, the postman, milk man, kids at Halloween, carol singers, etc.

Given this is an automatic sensor, people would just quickly just ignore it without even checking the footage - this even before any racial or social prejudices had chance to kick in.

We see this all the time with software monitoring solutions in IT what sysadmins ignore if they are too sensitive so my comment here isn’t without precedence either.

But essentially we are both arguing that an overly sensitive alarm is a bad thing - just from different perspectives. You make the point about discrimination and I make the point about the alerting being worthless in a sea of ignored alarms. Ultimately we’re both skeptical

Re: Amazon’s Disturbing Plan to Add Face Surveillance to Your Front Door

#106

Post by mosselman »

CalRobert wrote: post #9
mosselman wrote: post #3

News messages such as these are increasingly scary and alarming. They paint a picture of a very nearby dystopian society that, until now, was the stuff of fiction. The news is successful in scaring us, but what can we do against this type of thing? What can I as an individual do? I can install ad-blockers, etc on my PC, but how can I prevent the technology described in the article from impacting my life or that of my…

Well, you can: * Push your politicians to support GDPR-style legislation * Donate to your politicians so they actually listen * Run for office * Try some weird tech solution like dazzle clothing (this won't work most likely) * Take inspiration from Exit, Voice, and Loyalty, and emigrate to a place with governance that more closely reflects your own values. A place covered by the GDPR would be a good start. _Presumabl…

Thanks for the suggestions. They follow some of my own thoughts.

> Push your politicians to support GDPR-style legislation

Luckily I live in the EU, only 'luckily' might be an overstatement with regards to privacy if you look at the article 13 issue. Apart from that, at least to what I perceive, privacy carries at least some meaning here still.

> Donate to your politicians so they actually listen

I do not have enough money to make politicians listen I think.

> Run for office

This seems like one of the only conceivable routes to take that could have some real impact. I don't want to run for some political office, but at some point I might have to.

Correct me if I am wrong, but I think Nietzsche thought that we shouldn't give power that those who want it. Right now there are a lot of people in power who want that political power and use that to advance themselves in life, rather than helping society. Not only in politics however; Amazon's developers who work on these intrusive technologies are just as guilty. I would not work on this type of technology because I can't justify this to myself as a person, but apparently many people leave the person they are at the door when they go to work, developers and politicians alike.

> ...emigrate...

I could consider this at some stage, but that would be to protect myself and my family against imaginable changes to political situations with regards to privacy, not as much as a way to force government to change their views.

> ... live off-grid

This sounds like a great way to draw attention to yourself. Besides, I don't want to live in the woods, I want to live in society without my privacy being violated constantly by advertisers, other companies and government. Because everybody has a right to their thoughts staying their own.

Re: Amazon’s Disturbing Plan to Add Face Surveillance to Your Front Door

#107

Post by richrichardsson »

Klonoar wrote: post #54
richrichardsson wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ring their doorbell. When they answer, tell them "Hi, this isn't the house I was looking for, but you've got that surveillance system in place, so I don't want to be registered as 'suspicious'. OK, sorry not sorry for wasting your time, goodbye."

...for every house? I don't go up to random houses and ring their doorbells to begin with, because nobody does that anymore.

Did you think I was suggesting doing this to every house with the system? Not my intention at all. I was replying to hypothetical "walked up to the wrong house" scenario.

Re: Amazon’s Disturbing Plan to Add Face Surveillance to Your Front Door

#108

Post by CalRobert »

mosselman wrote: post #106
CalRobert wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, you can: * Push your politicians to support GDPR-style legislation * Donate to your politicians so they actually listen * Run for office * Try some weird tech solution like dazzle clothing (this won't work most likely) * Take inspiration from Exit, Voice, and Loyalty, and emigrate to a place with governance that more closely reflects your own values. A place covered by the GDPR would be a good start. _Presumabl…

Thanks for the suggestions. They follow some of my own thoughts. > Push your politicians to support GDPR-style legislation Luckily I live in the EU, only 'luckily' might be an overstatement with regards to privacy if you look at the article 13 issue. Apart from that, at least to what I perceive, privacy carries at least some meaning here still. > Donate to your politicians so they actually listen I do not have enough…

"This sounds like a great way to draw attention to yourself. Besides, I don't want to live in the woods, I want to live in society without my privacy being violated constantly by advertisers, other companies and government. Because everybody has a right to their thoughts staying their own. "

Yeah, it just means you won't have to walk by the doorbells. I wasn't really serious about it. And between cheap drones, IR cameras, etc. if somebody wants to find you, they will.

At this point I think your only real hope is finding a place that aligns with your values, moving there, and working to keep it good. Effecting real change is 99% luck and places heading towards dystopia have a lot of wealthy forces arrayed against you.

Re: Amazon’s Disturbing Plan to Add Face Surveillance to Your Front Door

#109

Post by dvtrn »

laumars wrote: post #105
dvtrn wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can see how members of some communities might feel like the technology opens them up to more scrutiny than they probably deserve from an overzealous do-gooder (or busybody, depending on your perspective). Even if statistically the likelihood is low, I wouldn't say the fears of what this technology enables and could result in for someone simply being in the wrong neighborhood 'while black' are overly complicated or…

Like I said, I agree it’s a valid concern. My point was that for this kind of tech to be useful, it wouldn’t want to be that zealous with alerting otherwise the system would get flooded with false positives. That means door to door sales people, preachers, the postman, milk man, kids at Halloween, carol singers, etc. Given this is an automatic sensor, people would just quickly just ignore it without even checking the…

But essentially we are both arguing that an overly sensitive alarm is a bad thing

You might be. I'm not. I never once said it's a bad thing, or described it as overly sensitive, to be fair. Just that I could see how certain communities might look at the technology and what it enables and have good reason to be incredulous about how certain neighborhood actors will use it.

That's about a nuanced as I can possibly get on the topic without trying to argue in favor or against these devices in full, or taking any absolute position.

Re: Amazon’s Disturbing Plan to Add Face Surveillance to Your Front Door

#110

Post by JohnFen »

chaostheory wrote: post #94
JohnFen wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"not being safe for "a stroll through your own neighborhood" is not a problem for that world." I think that depends on what you consider "safe". Or perhaps I misunderstood what you were saying...

My definition is that you're not going to be hassled by anyone, government included.

That sounds fair, although personally, I count being under surveillance as being hassled. This is because when I believe that I'm under surveillance, it makes me more cautious in terms of what I say and do, and puts me under stress.
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