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Amazon admits giving police Ring camera footage without consent

theintercept.com

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Re: Amazon admits giving police Ring camera footage without consent

#11

Post by phailhaus »

nomilk wrote: post #5

It's often overlooked that users get happiness from privacy, and the mere risk of a breach (however small) makes risk-averse people unhappy, even if a breach never eventuates. Law enforcement might catch some more bad guys with 11 extra ring videos, but now every ring user has to worry about local police sharing/laughing/perving at their home videos - is it worth it? It might have been well intentioned, but Amazon's…

> It's often overlooked that users get happiness from privacy

That's not true though, at all. Users prefer convenience over privacy by far, just look at how much people still use Facebook, Google, TikTok, etc despite having terrible privacy practices. Those videos are too addicting. Being able to monitor your home is too convenient.

Re: Amazon admits giving police Ring camera footage without consent

#12

Post by phailhaus »

cddsadsa wrote: post #6
bsedlm wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what if my data is on my hardware as well as on the cloud hardware? whose data is it anyways?

What even is "data"? If you mean "my data is the way in which I interact with a website. It is personal to me and is my property.", then surely you must also say "my mannerisms when I talk to you are personal to me, and you may not remember them without my consent".

> you may not remember them without my consent

The Quantum Thief series takes this to its extreme, with a technology called "gevulot" which does exactly that by way of a societal exomemory. You can choose to "reveal" any aspect of your self all the way up to your appearance on a person-by-person basis. Highly recommend the book!

Re: Amazon admits giving police Ring camera footage without consent

#13

Post by nomilk »

phailhaus wrote: post #11
nomilk wrote: post #5

It's often overlooked that users get happiness from privacy, and the mere risk of a breach (however small) makes risk-averse people unhappy, even if a breach never eventuates. Law enforcement might catch some more bad guys with 11 extra ring videos, but now every ring user has to worry about local police sharing/laughing/perving at their home videos - is it worth it? It might have been well intentioned, but Amazon's…

> It's often overlooked that users get happiness from privacy That's not true though, at all. Users prefer convenience over privacy by far, just look at how much people still use Facebook, Google, TikTok, etc despite having terrible privacy practices. Those videos are too addicting. Being able to monitor your home is too convenient.

If forced to, users may forego privacy for convenience. But in the case of ring there's no reason users shouldn't be able to expect both.

Re: Amazon admits giving police Ring camera footage without consent

#14

Post by fotta »

helen___keller wrote: post #2

TLDR: > Although Ring publicizes its policy of handing over camera footage only if the owner agrees — or if judge signs a search warrant — the company says it also reserves the right to supply police with footage in “emergencies,” defined broadly as “cases involving imminent danger of death or serious physical injury to any person.” (…) > it has provided police with user footage 11 times this year alone. I would actu…

In your situation, the police should be asking YOU not Amazon for the footage.

I don’t have a problem with turning over footage, but not without my consent. I want to be able to decide when to give it to police.

Re: Amazon admits giving police Ring camera footage without consent

#15

Post by buscoquadnary »

karaterobot wrote: post #8

> “If there is the infrastructure, if there is the channel by which police can request footage without a warrant or consent of the user, under what circumstances they get it is out of our control. I worry that because it’s decided by the police and by somebody at Ring, there will be temptation to use that for increasingly less urgent situations.” Many people (I would argue anybody with common sense) predicted Ring wo…

So moved into a newly built house, by default everyone gets a smart doorbell in this house. They looked at me like I was crazy when I said I didn't want it or any of the other the "smart" devices.

This was the exact reason.

Re: Amazon admits giving police Ring camera footage without consent

#16

Post by AlwaysRock »

buscoquadnary wrote: post #15
karaterobot wrote: post #8

> “If there is the infrastructure, if there is the channel by which police can request footage without a warrant or consent of the user, under what circumstances they get it is out of our control. I worry that because it’s decided by the police and by somebody at Ring, there will be temptation to use that for increasingly less urgent situations.” Many people (I would argue anybody with common sense) predicted Ring wo…

So moved into a newly built house, by default everyone gets a smart doorbell in this house. They looked at me like I was crazy when I said I didn't want it or any of the other the "smart" devices. This was the exact reason.

To be fair... If you carry around a smart phone or have a smart watch or a laptop you're at just as much risk. The ring is just one more device.

Re: Amazon admits giving police Ring camera footage without consent

#17

Post by phailhaus »

nomilk wrote: post #13
phailhaus wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's often overlooked that users get happiness from privacy That's not true though, at all. Users prefer convenience over privacy by far, just look at how much people still use Facebook, Google, TikTok, etc despite having terrible privacy practices. Those videos are too addicting. Being able to monitor your home is too convenient.

If forced to, users may forego privacy for convenience. But in the case of ring there's no reason users shouldn't be able to expect both.

But they don't. They see the product, it's useful to them, they buy it. Practically nobody is doing research into privacy practices of the things they buy. It's only a problem if it becomes a news story.

Re: Amazon admits giving police Ring camera footage without consent

#18

Post by seanmcdirmid »

buscoquadnary wrote: post #15
karaterobot wrote: post #8

> “If there is the infrastructure, if there is the channel by which police can request footage without a warrant or consent of the user, under what circumstances they get it is out of our control. I worry that because it’s decided by the police and by somebody at Ring, there will be temptation to use that for increasingly less urgent situations.” Many people (I would argue anybody with common sense) predicted Ring wo…

So moved into a newly built house, by default everyone gets a smart doorbell in this house. They looked at me like I was crazy when I said I didn't want it or any of the other the "smart" devices. This was the exact reason.

I guess if you don’t have prowler or package theft problems, they aren’t really necessary. I personally have found my Nest cameras indispensable. Ironically, if police would just do their job on property crime, they wouldn’t be so needed.

Re: Amazon admits giving police Ring camera footage without consent

#19

Post by AlwaysRock »

BurningFrog wrote: post #10
helen___keller wrote: post #2

TLDR: > Although Ring publicizes its policy of handing over camera footage only if the owner agrees — or if judge signs a search warrant — the company says it also reserves the right to supply police with footage in “emergencies,” defined broadly as “cases involving imminent danger of death or serious physical injury to any person.” (…) > it has provided police with user footage 11 times this year alone. I would actu…

11 emergencies a year across the US sounds perfectly reasonable.

Sure. What were the emergencies though? Police knew a ring cam had evidence of a murder on it? Or police knew ring cam had some footage of where they dropped their keys last night?

Who defines emergency? If its the police then anything they need it for is an emergency.

Re: Amazon admits giving police Ring camera footage without consent

#20

Post by ubermonkey »

AlwaysRock wrote: post #16
buscoquadnary wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So moved into a newly built house, by default everyone gets a smart doorbell in this house. They looked at me like I was crazy when I said I didn't want it or any of the other the "smart" devices. This was the exact reason.

To be fair... If you carry around a smart phone or have a smart watch or a laptop you're at just as much risk. The ring is just one more device.

Well, no, not exactly.

The ring is an always-on camera. My phone is not that. My phone may leak some information about me, and its basic job (cell phone) provides a record of location data, but that's not the same thing as forcibly making a home security device into part of a police state panopticon.

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