Amazon Ring went from a smart doorbell company to a surveillance network
vice.com
vice.com
I would install Ring if it was closed loop system. Same thing with other technologies to make a smart home. Why so many people (especially the ones that understand technology) seem to be ok with this? This attitude causes that there are less and less options for privacy conscious people.
Hikvision cameras have the benefit of not being wireless and using Power over Ethernet for people who don't mind running some cable. I think that has a lot of value over a bunch of cameras killing your wifi. Off the shelf cheap routers do poor with a ton of wifi cameras it seems.
Blue Iris can send you mobile alerts without a subscription. All videos are stored locally & it's very configurable.
You could upload alert photos/videos to a cloud provider for cheap off-site hosting if you choose. That way if the bad people destroy your PC you still have video unless they take out your internet. One could setup limited backup internet with a mobile company for this case &/or for when your internet goes out in general. This of course applies equally to Nest/Ring etc.
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Honestly I'm surprised Ring/Nest/etc still charge for storing video footage. At this point I would have figured they would have found one of countless ways to monopolize off the video footage. Most average people seem to be fine with their data being sold if it provides them some value.
I' also wondering when the first services will start to pop up that provide a marketplace for video footage.
"Hikvision is fighting for its survival after the U.S. banned the company in October, accusing it of helping Beijing crack down on Muslim minorities in the far-western region of Xinjiang. "
[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-11-13/china-pro...
Many would suggest to keep your cameras from accessing the internet or anything but your Blue Iris server. This sounds like a fairly common practice.
I have no insider info but from reading the news it appears that what China is doing is several levels sketchier than Amazon/Ring when it comes to infringing on civil liberties.
Protecting your self is one thing; supporting that kind of regime with your money is another.
Unless you monitor the network it is very likely that it is pinging a Chinese server.
Many years ago we bought a treadmill with LCD screen and Android running on it with a browser and other stuff. Connected it to WiFi and were happy.
A couple of years later I got a Ubiquiti edgerouter, configured it and decided to check its deep packet filtering. It started showing me an odd Chinese domain being pinged periodically, like every 5 min. Don't remember the domain but it was some Chinese search engine/portal I had never heard of (not Baidu). It took me a while to figure out that it was the treadmill that was doing this. At which point I had to just disconnect it. I have no idea why it was doing what it was doing and what data it was sending and if I was running a backdoor in my home all this time.
Point I'm trying to make is, don't assume. Mistrust and Verify should be the modern day mantra for Internet connected, especially Chinese, devices.
I have a Hikvision NVR and 4k camera setup. I keep them on a separate subnet and have blocked all access to other subnets and the internet via a Mikrotik router.
In the year or so I have had this setup there hasn't been a single packet from the NVR or cameras in an attempt to access the internet.
The way I do it is: When I leave my home my home assistant will enable the FTP upload on motion detection feature of the camera. If there's motion then the camera will upload the recording to a ftp server running locally (synology), this then gets synced to google drive.
Home assistant can also do push notifications if there's movement detected.
for example: if you want the NVR to upload to Dropbox, you would whitelist the list of domains that are needed for Dropbox to work. if the NVR tries to connect to 'heartbeat.hikvsn.cn' it would fail.
Fascinatingly, China has a mix of public - private infrastructure. E.g. wireless payments are provided by WeChat and AliPay (although in the West it's not much different, it's Visa/MasterCard), and I guess in the US, Amazon is the private side, and the cops are the public side.
GDPR request here we come...
My setup is perhaps a bit gilt edged but then I am a sysadmin and networks bod and PHB all in one odd package! Home IT needs to step up its game. If you get done over then the cost can be very high. I don't think it is sufficient to simply use your ISP provided router, plug in a few IoT thingies and download a few phone apps and stick your fingers in your ears and chant la-la-la.
I would hope that most of the inhabitants of this parish are capable of putting together a reasonably safe setup and also look after their less technical friends and family (it can be a thankless task but a I think it is a duty.)
Don't forget that your attic, garage or cellar may make good places to keep IT gear in but do consider heat, cold, dust and fire risks.
ZM isn't perfect but it has been around for a very long time. Would you mind sharing your reasons for dumping ZM and why Shinobi cured them?
I'm diving in here: https://shinobi.video/docs/
Because there are no viable alternative devices. It's now impossible to buy a non-smart TV because smart TVs were cheaper (due to surveillance-funded subsidies).
The next best thing would probably be open-source firmware installed on these consumer device, paired with a self-hosted home-assistant.io
https://www.scmagazine.com/home/security-news/iot/modern-aut...
The majority of the options out there were connected to some kind of "cloud" service. I was even more surprised when I saw that a lot of popular options mandated a cloud subscription with no local storage. There is no need whatsoever to have any of this on the cloud at all. Especially with multiple hundreds of gigabytes of SD storage being so cheap these days.
In the end I went with a cheap Chinese camera which has unofficial open source firmware available (Dafang). Works like a charm.
Use the ubuntu "motion" package and record pic/video when motion is detected.
Use some python script to auto upload new files to google drive. I can use any google drive sw in ios/android to view pictures in some folder. The folder can be shared with family members can be view remotely. Kinda fun project.
Works ok - But it used a lot space. Have to actively manage share folder.
I am looking for similar setup for quite a few of old android phones laying around. Plan to write one myself when I have time....
If anyone know a good solution with old android phone HW + G Drive, please share.
PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND
437 cam 20 0 120072 23352 15156 S 12.8 6.2 41:56.21 motion
3417 regusr 20 0 8128 3272 2748 R 1.6 0.9 0:00.55 top
37 root 1 -19 0 0 0 S 0.6 0.0 1:39.16 vchiq-slot/0
191 cam 20 0 59000 20040 9852 S 0.6 5.3 2:04.44 meyectl
2334 tun 20 0 9180 4948 4404 S 0.3 1.3 0:00.97 ssh
3398 regusr 20 0 11512 3780 3036 S 0.3 1.0 0:00.11 sshd
3404 root 20 0 0 0 0 I 0.3 0.0 0:00.09 kworker/u2:1
3418 root 20 0 0 0 0 I 0.3 0.0 0:00.04 kworker/0:2Its not perfect, but I feel mostly safe having this camera now.
If not, there are some guides on YouTube (unfortunately I can't search right now on this corporate network) that involve buying old laptop cameras on ebay and stringing them up with putty to an old laptop in a closet. I'm pretty sure the man in the video I'm thinking of was from the UK since the prices were in pounds, but there would be others. It all looked fairly simple but I can't recall how sophisticated the software was re: motion detection, offsite contact, etc.
Otherwise, it's gonna be like GMail -- sure, you can run your own mail server, but 80+% of humanity will decide that they can't or have better things to do, and Google will end up with all the email between you and them anyway.
You can make your own smart home camera, but 80+% of the world will install Ring or something similar, and that means you will be on their camera footage and therefore your comings and goings will be part of Amazon/SurveillanceCo (absent consistent deployment of effective countermeasures).
0: https://help.ubnt.com/hc/en-us/articles/235404507-UniFi-Vide...
Essentially, the same people who care about this are also likely to say "you can already build such a system yourself quite trivially by getting an FTP account, mounting it locally with curlftpfs, and then using SVN or CVS on the mounted filesystem" to Dropbox.
If you do succeed building and selling this I'll be very impressed.
Lots of people are trying the local storage thing, though: (not customizable store-to-my-S3 stuff, but I think that's a vanishingly small market)
* https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/vacos-cam-smartest-ai-wir...
* https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/wuuk-the-world-s-most-adv...
* https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/imilab-ec2-your-life-free...
* https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/camect-world-s-smartest-m...
* https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/capsulecam-home-security-...
* https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/simcam-an-unparalleled-ai...
I've thought about this a lot and have quite a notebook full of ideas/notes on this: I think there's room in the market for a privacy-focused open-source home security system utilizing micro-controllers (Raspberry Pi, Arduino, Adafruit, etc.) and secure cryptographic protocols. You could make revenue assembling pre-built security sensors built from the micro-controller ecosystem, perhaps with good modern aesthetics, but the more security conscious of us could buy and build everything ourselves based on the spec for each sensor.
I mean we’re firmly in hobbiest/semi-pro territory here but shipping the data encrypted to your own cloud instance or box colo’d in a local data center would be fine.
It supports all the usual cloud and remote access junk, but fortunately none of it is necessary for operation.
It does motion detection internally and only records when something happens in the frame. Most importantly, it support ftp uploading these event recordings to a configurable server.
I put it on a physically separate network which has nearly nothing else and certainly no internet connectivity in any direction (I see the camera attempting to contact google DNS every now and then). I would never trust any of these cameras, regardless of manufacturer, with internet access no matter how limited.
The only other thing on that network is a box which exposes only ftp, so the camera uploads activity to it.
Optionally, from a physically separate network you can then pull the videos to some other host which has internet access and upload them elsewhere for remote safekeeping.
But yes, it is sad that one needs to know how to set this up just to preserve basic privacy.
Ignorance and convenience. Most people I know who own one and are aware of the privacy issues choose to ignore them because they're easy to install and just work. Then there are people who don't know or don't care (ignorant).
It only has a webbased client, but I kind of like it and the beta version has been way better than any of the cheap dvr trash that big box stores sell.
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/camect-world-s-smartest-m...
I think the problem is if someone makes open hardware and software that people like and doesn't "lock them into your ecosystem / cloud", then another company can clone and sell the same thing with no R&D overhead to recoup. It's even easier and cheaper for a company completely based in china to do it. So it is risky for companies to do that.
I would love to hear of counter-arguments and counter-examples.
Home Assistant Cloud is one example of this: https://www.nabucasa.com/
Almost all high-end gear (Axis, etc.) is also easily self-hostable but obviously expensive since it's high-end.
I live in Albuquerque. We have Ring cameras, and I feel so much safer when I leave town. We caught someone rifling through our pickup truck a few weeks ago and were able to correlate it with other reports in the area so that if/when these thieves are caught, they'll go away for longer.
Why did I decide to buy these cameras? We were subject to a massive burglary a couple of years ago in which we lost $30k worth of valuables.
There are always downsides to every security-related thing, but I highly appreciate the ability to better police my own property, and I bet a bunch of other people feel the same.
I have a camera system that is similar, I set it up myself, and I could do exactly what you suggested. All without also telling amazon my neighbor goes to-and-from their house 6 times a day (because my door camera faces them). Or that my daughter comes home from school at 3pm.
IP security cameras are inexpensive and readily available, and support things like remote access fine. (And I say this from first hand experience)
When you narrow the counterargument to the actual differential features of ring-like solutions-- that they automatically store video offsite mitigating by default the fringe risk that a thief takes the recorder--, the argument in favor of handing this video feed to state and corporate surveillance apparatus alike is much less interesting.
It would be trivial for ring to encrypt the video with a password only known to the device and your remote client never to the server... and would avoid a lot of trouble dealing with requests for video and potential civil ligation for leaks. The primary reason these products don't is because surveilling the user is the business proposition.
Aside: I have lots of security cameras, I like security cameras. Yet at the same time people radically overestimate their usefulness in stopping crime: The positioning and lighting have to be nearly perfect to get a shot that you can identify a stranger with and it's easy for people to conceal their faces against an unmonitored camera. Even if you do get a clear face shot the police often can do nothing useful with it. With the low prices today I think cameras can well worth their price, ... but where they create mass surveillance risks, the case is far less clear.
If you already know who you're looking for they can be quite useful. They can be quite effective when they're used to help document violations of an order of protection or restraining order, where even a profile shot at an odd angle is sufficient.
Anyone interested in cameras should check out the forum at https://ipcamtalk.com/
One of the reoccurring points there though is actual experience with the low utility of cameras-- especially if they're not very carefully positioned and prolific-- at identifying strangers.
That is not trivial for most people. I doubt it was even trivial for you unless it’s a built-in feature for an off the shelf system. Setting up an open source surveillance system isn’t exactly what I would call easy
People want a plug and play solution. At least systems from Google and Amazon will probably be reasonably secure so they won't get roped into the next botnet when their owners forget to change default creds.
Amazon and others know this. They don't offer it on purpose, because they want to retain control and a new revenue stream.
I work making computers do stuff all day, I don't want to futz around with them on my free time. This is also why Apple TV/Tivo has beaten out MythTV in my home.
It's trivial to get a camera setup and recording. The hard part is getting useful data out of that 24x7x365 (per camera) stream.
A lot of these articles make it sound like Ring gives unilateral full access to the police, which is just plain and simple FUD.
Actually, we know that a large portion of data obtained by the NSA can be shared with law enforcement[1]. We also know the NSA isn't exactly upfront about how much they collect and that they can basically collect what they wish without reprocusions[2]. We also know that Ring has given access to police and partnered with 630+ departments[3] directly.
Not even close to "plain and simple FUD", as most things it's a bit more nuanced.
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/12/us/politics/nsa-gets-more...
[2] https://www.pbs.org/video/frontline-united-states-secrets-pa...
[3] https://www.cnet.com/news/ring-gave-police-a-street-level-vi...
As for the third one, I'm not sure what your point is. The specific article only speaks of a heatmap of doorbells. The article also states the the precise location of the doorbell isn't even given, let alone footage.
I don't think anyone considers that data to be anywhere equal to giving access to video feed. You can simply drive down the road and see which houses have a Ring doorbell, or probably even detect them sniffing packets.
Buying less "on the cloud by default" devices and using encryption.
Your latter point doesn't really make sense. I'm fairly sure all of these devices use encryption to the cloud, it's just that the NSA has access to the unencrypted data on the cloud itself, theoretically. Unless you mean storing your own encrypted data on the cloud, which again goes back to the point above.
If you refuse to give police the video they can just request from amazon directly. You don't get to control what happens to that video once it touches amazon's servers. Once the police have it they can keep it forever, share it with others (like ICE or the FBI), and once again you have no control. Amazon tracks people who refuse to hand over video to the police directly and they share stats about them with police.
What are you talking about?
As discussed here not that long ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21346307
Nowhere in the original there's talk of giving user location, yet Yahoo someone starts talking of "detailed map of doorbell installation", for whatever definition of "detailed".
"the heat map showed police where Ring cameras are concentrated: the darker the shade, the more the cameras. But when zoomed in, it would show light circles around individual locations,"
It also links to other cases where maps of cameras were sent to police by amazon such as the one shown here:
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/aug/29/ring-amaz...
It's incredibly dumb to host 24x7 video surveillance of your home and your comings and goings outside of your home.
"Incredibly dumb" is way out of line. Many people (including me) find having such video available to be extremely useful. Yes, there is a tradeoff involved if you are buying the video capability from a third party instead of rolling your own, but many people find it a tradeoff worth making.
When you host information with a third party, your only protection is your contract.
Can you give some specific examples?
Also, storing data outside of the home (or at least backup copies of it) might be a good idea in case something happens to your home.
The police can ask nicely for it by requesting it, or demand the video with a warrant or subpoena.
Getting a warrant or subpoena for your video data is infinitely easier than it would be without Ring as an intermediary, because Ring already told the police the data does, indeed, exist and that you have it. It's also infinitely easier because a judge is more likely to sign off on a warrant for video from a specific person and camera, than they are for a warrant that casts a wider net.
If they go to Ring with a warrant for video the company says you have, you don't even have to be notified when its taken.
Good for you, and if Ring cameras are positioned so that they can't see past your property line, then I have no problem with them.
However, I have a really serious problem with people who install cloudy surveillance cameras -- especially those from Amazon -- in such a way that they capture innocent people walking by your house.
I don't think anyone should have the right to subject such people to surveillance networks like that, and strongly condemn those that do.
Amazon Ring is a different beast entirely. With your help, Amazon has even more data--in addition to every other user's raw video feed--and the computing resources to be able to pinpoint a frighteningly large number of people at any given moment.
That's a scary amount of power, and a direct threat to liberty. Aiding and abetting such an enterprise deserves strong condemnation at the least.
You imply Amazon is willing to use the data it collects for liberty threatening purposes, do you think Google wouldn’t?
To be explicit: at what point do you draw the line and why now with this product and company?
My perspective on this is easy -- this isn't a problem I have to deal with much, because almost nobody that I exchange email with uses Gmail.
But yes, I avoid sending email to gmail accounts when feasible. When not feasible, I keep the emails as brief as I can, and I don't engage in lengthy exchanges.
This is correct. I'm not worried about the cameras, I'm worried about the database and who is in control of it.
Allowing suspects to refuse to answer questions--a/k/a "remaining silent"--means that some people who commit crimes won't self-incriminate, and won't wind up being "punished."
Interrogating suspects without a lawyer present is a related tool for solving more burglaries.
Allowing suspects to have a lawyer present during interrogation definitely means that some people who commit burglaries won't be "punished."
So advocating for the right of suspects to remain silent, and to have a lawyer present during interrogation are both indirect ways of advocating for people committing burglaries to not be punished.
Same for advocating that police evidence which is "fruit of the poisoned tree" not be admissible in court. Or really, for any limitation on enforcement.
It's all implicitly choosing that allowing some people who commit crimes to go free, serves a greater good.
TL;DR The phrase "Advocating that people committing burglaries not be punished" has a lot of nuänce to it. Best not to try to spin it as a simple boolean.
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There's another thing, which is the word "punished." Punishment is not, and should not, be a goal in any civilized society. That's a whole 'nother discussion, but for the purpose of discussing surveillance, let's agree that we are talking about convicting people who commit crimes, and leave the discussion fo what to do after obtaining a conviction for another day.
As written, the question positions a discussion about the uses of surveillance technology and the social side-effects as an accusation that people with concerns are against “punishing burglars.”
The problem here is with that kind of, “So, you’re in favour of more crime” rhetoric. In the past, that has been used in extremely dangerous ways.
1. Currently no legally recognized right is being violated by police when they are given Ring surveillance footage from a homeowner to prosecute a potential criminal.
2. But perhaps we should codify some right that prevents the police from obtaining Ring surveillance footage from a homeowner to prosecute a potential criminal.
I agree with 1, but I disagree with 2, and further I suspect you're going to have quite the uphill battle convincing the majority of people some right should exist that prevents homeowners from providing surveillance footage to the police.
Win or lose, such arguments are about the appropriate amount of surveillance and the rights of people who may not be criminals but who are caught on "film," who has access to that film, and what can be done with the evidence in that film.
I'm totally up for an argument that what Ring does is appropriate. I'm just not up for arguing that questioning Ring is "Arguing that criminals go unpunished."
Specifically the comment author was insinuating that just by eradicating a group of individuals out of the society (as punishment) would stop other people to do the same. It seems a very dangerous way of thinking.
Longer answer: People who commit one burglary often commit multiple burglaries. State's Attorneys won't prosecute cases if they don't have strong evidence. The number of burglary victims in a month is basically given by (number of burglars active in a month)(average frequency of burglary in a month). To reduce the number of victims, you could reduce the number of active burglars in an area, and/or you could work to reduce the frequency of burglary by hardening the world, which would be prohibitively expensive. The former strategy is much less expensive, as video evidence is strong evidence, and video cameras have become very affordable and convenient to operate. This helps build stronger cases, which can remove predators from communities, which averts all of the offenses that the predator would have committed had they not been jailed. It is possible to burgle a home with cameras, just as it's possible to get the flu despite a flu shot, but both the cameras and the flu shots help defend more of society against harm.
B. It's a preventive control. People doing recon on your place will see that visible security is in place and that you have done some level of risk management. Perhaps you have other security measures there as well such as an alarm, or maybe you secure your valuables with a safe or they are stored off site which they can't know until they get in. It makes you a less appealing, higher risk target. Additionally, in most neighborhoods you can't walk around in a ski mask without attracting attention, so many burglaries will be done with faces exposed. If someone bursts in and sees they are on camera, maybe they leave without taking anything.
I know that there's a lot of (possibly astroturfed) youtubes out there about thefts being deterred but what are the actual stats?
TLDR: Yeah, there are many investigations that are only cleared because of CCTV footage, including Ring footage. No, that data isn't public.
Be sure to read the whole thing.
( nice username tho )
How many of these kinds of things actually happen to prevent crimes? And how many of these are break-ins rather than package theft?
You have 20 seconds to comply.
30 Minutes into the blizzard a loud SUV rolls up right next to us. My wife and I turned off the lights and opened the windows to watch. They didn't go near our truck. But within 3 minutes they were rifling in someone else's truck bed. They then opened the SUV's back hatch, threw a large box in and drove off, all at a super-fast speed indicating they've done this before.
The RV Park replied to the reviews about theft and kinda blamed various people for leaving their stuff outside, unlucked.
The larger park next door thought ahead and installed security cameras and security gates. The park next door is about $5-$10 more per night. Well worth it.
Just because something is published by vice doesn't automatically make it untrue (though it broadly is very suspect). However, you've made the great case yourself that these product purchases are motivated by fear, not by material return on investment.
You say that a person searching through your pickup/ other peoples stuff is going to go away for longer when they are caught because of the ring surveillance network.
Do you as a person who uses HN, has the money to buy a Ring and can weather the loss of $30k in valuables (which is a terrible thing and I can only imagine how traumatic it would be, I would probably buy a ring after that as well) really need to make sure that the pickup truck sniffer gets the maximum jail time?
Our prisons are supposed to be some of the most crowded in the world.[1] There are networks just for exfelons to try and get jobs because so much of the gen pop turns them away at this instant red flag.[2] Among Americans who aren't in prison >50% can't pay a $500 emergency expense.
I'm willing to accept that a lot of these people could work hard and reach a higher level of financial security in life but they choose not to. I have no issues with you having worked hard and wanting to protect what you've earned and making sure others don't pillage your things.
Does an extra 5 years in prison for the truck snooper really make you feel safer? Do we really need to make sure that more people are subjected to our prison system that does little to rehabilitate people?
Will fear and mistrust bring us a safer nation? What is really gained by you personally by ensuring that the perp get's twice the sentence? Does it bring you twice your lost assets? Do you fundamentally gain in anyway by putting a nonviolent offender into a cage for extra time?
Maybe the hope is that we can lock up all the criminals and the streets will be safe of porch pirates. I've heard somewhere that you can't have the top without the bottom. If we get rid of the least violent criminals committing the crimes that have a low and local impact who do we expect to be left to represent that necessary bottom but the mass thieves of fake financial firms and slaughter happy killers?
To put it in a very abstract metaphorical way: If you stumble on a hike and twist your ankle and have to break a branch off of a tree to use as a support to get you home... how much should you suffer for breaking that branch? should they also compound all the twigs you stepped on into your sentence?
[1]https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2019.html [2]https://exoffenders.net/employment-jobs-for-felons/ [3]https://www.forbes.com/sites/maggiemcgrath/2016/01/06/63-of-...
The reliance on remote storage limits the resolution and number of cameras, making it much less likely that you'll manage to capture a clear face shot esp from someone intentionally concealing their face.
Thieves stealing the recorder is something I think I've never heard reported in a residential setting, however. It's certainly a much less common problem for cameras than people covering their faces.
Non-cloud camera systems can still upload remotely (and there is the potential of encrypting those realtime backups, at least w/ some systems). My camera system takes periodic and event driven still snapshots, encrypts them, and uploads them remotely. (Though, I admit, I implemented the encryption step myself). Bonus: sending only snapshots means that it can reasonably be done over cellular, which keeps it going even if all the lines are cut.
I have only talked about cloud based backups, not running the entire system via the cloud. Of course it's best if you have an on-site storage of video material, as well as a (live) off-site backup.
I'm not a proponent of Ring. In fact, I'd never put their hardware into my house. However, there are advantages of putting video footage into the cloud (encrypted or in the clear). Compare this to internet based locks where there are no advantages that can't be done locally as well.
1) In the case of WiFi cameras, sending of deauth packets or signal jamming the 2.4/5ghz spectrum.
2) Damaging of fibre/copper cables which might be out of view of the camera.
3) Turning off power to the property although this might draw attention.
Given the sheer popularity of WiFi cameras, I can't see it being too long before a device capable of spamming deauth packets becomes a common part of the burglars toolset. esp8266's with the appropriate firmware can already be found on ebay for less than £10.
For 1 and 2, ideally you'd avoid WiFi cameras for the reason you stated and use cable based ones and put everything into view.
To 3, actually this happened recently in my country Germany where they stole crown jewels of one of the german states. The alarm system died and allowed for silent entry but the CCTV still worked (no idea why it worked tho, maybe backup power for CCTV only but not for the alarm?). Ideally both your CCTV and alarm system run from some way of backup power.
How many break ins are professional thieves with any kind of toolkit vs drug addicts and kids who just smash a window with whatever they find or take advantage of opportunities like an unlocked car or a package left outside? I'm guessing that the vast majority aren't bringing tech, lockpicks or even masks.
https://www.art-of-lockpicking.com/criminals-dont-pick-locks...
Ahh, I looked at the linked article, and it's not just lockpicking, it's "picked lock or window", which presumably also includes things like using a knife blade to slide a window latch open.
Further in the article it mentions this:
If you were to separate lock picking from shimming latches, the percentage of lock picking incidents would very likely evaporate.
...
However, because we have no data to separate these two methods of bypassing — that is lock picking and shimming –, we will stick with the higher survey number of 4.1% for good measure.
But wait, that’s 4.1% of ONLY non-forced burglaries. What about ALL burglaries— forced and non-forced?
...
That’s only 1.36% of TOTAL burglaries that utilize either picking a lock or shimming.
"Good to have a source to show they aren't "mainly used for crime"
"I think that source shows crime doesn't mainly use lockpicking"
Imagine:
1 million crimes, 1% use lock picks. 10,000 lock pick usages in crime.
18,180 total lock pick usages, of which 55%, or 10,000 are used in crimes.
In this scenario crime mostly doesn't use lock picks (99% of crimes didn't) but lock picks are still mainly used for crime (55% of lock pick usage is).
Of course I just made up these numbers as an example. It's just a logical point about what the article shows. I'm sure most lock pick usage is to get people into things they've been locked out of or hobbyists playing around.
Of course, neither of these are likely to happen, as criminals that are doing burglaries are in a hurry and not looking for security camera DVRs and data stores, but valuables they can fence quickly like TVs, stereos and jewelry.
If "Stealing your CCTV's recorder" is actually in your threat model, maybe then you should consider a cloud-based solution (or, you know, a real security system and not just a CCTV system). But this just isn't the general case - not even close. The vast majority of these systems are essentially nanny/evil-maid cams.
disable smart assistants on your phone and the phone won't start recording you "accidentally". You don't have that option with a smart speaker.
https://thenextweb.com/google/2019/07/10/google-contractors-...
https://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/apple-siri-listening-re...
In fact, you do. Amazon Echos have a physical button that disables the microphone. Apple HomePod has a setting to disable the "Hey Siri" feature. I haven't tested this, but I presume that both continue functioning perfectly fine as Bluetooth/AirPlay speakers.
Information which couldn't have existed without a) wide spread usage b) incentives to turn them all in to surveillance-lite devices
Helping 5-year olds spell words and check math homework, play classical music (learning composers) and dance music, tell stories, etc.
It’s like a fun and useful version of a radio.
Recently the 3 and 5 year old have had fun trying to turn on Alexa without saying Alexa (because we told them to stop using it to randomly play baby shark without asking...).
Ah lek ah
Also, there's a well-established framework of laws governing under what conditions and by whom your telephone conversations can be monitored. For Alexa/GA, you're at the mercy of the TOS.
It seems the entire point of the camera is actually to gather evidence to hand off to police after a crime happens.
This is people taking a trade off. Security for Privacy slider.
If you don't have the time or skills, and you wouldn't trust a local installer to set everything up right, you really don't have that option.
When you're in a situation where time is scarce, like dual income, kid, etc, you clearly are optimising for other things than privacy or even money spent.
If you initially pitched Ring as a device that was directly connected to the local police department MORE people would buy it, not less. In the 90s, monitored home security was a booming business. The average person wanted it but couldn't afford it. People would pay thousands for an installation and thousands more per year to have someone monitor cameras and call the police if there was an issue.
Locked boxes at the house or going to the postal service to receive your package would get rid of most of the issues regarding package stealing, right?
What's the downside of that? Is it worse than using a phone with lots of Google software on it?
The idea that simply owning a cell phone invalidates any effort or incentive to try to keep the personal details of your life from any company ever is deeply flawed.
We all make trade-offs and must decide for ourselves what amount of data we're comfortable handing over to companies who profit from surveillance capitalism. Personally, I can install a camera without giving amazon data about me. I can't get a cell phone that doesn't leak information to google or apple (although I can try to limit what I use my cell phone for and what data those devices leak)
The data companies collect from you is sold to others who collect it and sell it in turn. Dossiers are constructed about you as an individual listing your specific traits, activities, political leanings, etc. You can't see what these companies have decided about you, how accurate it is, who has access to your data, how they are using it, how (or if) they are securing it.
Sometimes when it comes back to bite you in the ass you'll know. your data will be leaked to the public internet, or you'll be a victim of identify theft.
Other times, your life will be impacted but you won't know why. Maybe you don't get called back for an interview at a job you wanted, but you don't know it was because they didn't like something saw in a report from a data broker (you bought too much alcohol for example). Maybe your insurance rates go up next year, but you won't know it's because of how often you eat out. Maybe you can't get a table at the restaurant you wanted to eat at, or maybe you're paying $10 more for a product you buy online than your neighbor, maybe you just wait on a hold a little longer than others when you call customer service, but you won't know it's because you weren't rated highly enough on your secret "consumer score".
The way the data companies collect can be used against you are myriad and subtle, but it's being done all the time, it's probably already impacted you. You just aren't allowed to know it.
Whether it's some dubious data from suspect source, or it's your gender, you might find some opportunities more difficult, premiums more expensive, interviews not bringing job offer. When it's just one isolated, it proves little, but in aggregate... We already know many of these data models are very wrong. When Amazon recommend products for me, they do so terribly. When Google and Facebook famously opened up their respective "what we know about you" pages a few years back, they were - for most in our office - dramatically and hilariously wrong. Often getting every key point wrong like gender, age group, and 9 of 10 interests. AI models are often reported to have gained or inbuilt bias and racism.
It doesn't feel obviously bad, but in the cargo cult of targeted advertising, they've demonstrated they're unfit for purpose. Yet the vast data stores influence all our lives daily -- we really need an audit to identify all those micro impacts and data derived discrimination, as it's undermining any belief in a rational basis and a fair chance in society.
The insurance argument is pretty persuasive though. Effective insurance requires a big pool. For the same reason that ultra-precise categorization for insurance ruins insurance, ultra-precise targeting of individuals ruins advertising if we want ad-supported platforms.
Regulation is more important than ever.
I don't want a chilling effect on the next generation such that every party or moment of drunkenness can be held against them in job search. Every teen has moments of idiocy -- mine thankfully were not in the age of constant surveillance, and there wasn't a smart phone or CCTV in sight. Not much freedom to grow in a world where every worst moment goes viral, or gets you on one of the "next door" neighbourhood snooping apps. Where hanging around with friends on a street corner has old folks flagging suspicious behaviour. Give us all room to breathe. Interfere via authorities when you have genuine reason to suspect. No, I don't much like where we're headed and preferred the proposition before.
Totally agree on regulation, but it seems to be coming far too slowly -- globally.
It's not making the assumption that your government is never going to be rounding people up for brainwashing/torture/gassing/etc ever again.
When that happens, all the data these surveillance companies have is going to make the future gestapo downright gleeful.
The network is both a fascinating source of local news and -- more to the point -- a surprisingly-valuable tool for people who live in places that the police ignore (or don't have the resources to protect).
Once the 'guy who steals Amazon packages' has his face on camera in the act of stealing a package, and someone on every block in a 2 mile radius knows it, it makes his life on the street that much less fun. The community can police itself with tools like this.
This is why I'm uneasy with the idea that we should allow revealed preferences to make decisions about the level of ambient privacy we have in US society. There's clearly something pushing people to buy these things, and it isn't a higher crime rate.
[0] https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/10/17/facts-about...
Package stealing, particularly this time of year, is rampant, and the first time I installed the app I was able to see all of these local reports near me and watch footage of people stealing packages. This is a HUGE deterrent as soon as word gets out that certain houses are "bugged".
I think about it from this perspective and immediately think of the "giving up liberty for safety" quote, but I refuse to have any speakers _inside_ of my home. The camera is pointing out towards the street, in broad daylight, in public. I like knowing when my dog walker shows up, when packages arrive, and of course when someone down the block sees a random guy trying to break into cars parked on the street.
Overall, I'm conflicted over it, but I'm reminded several times a day (when the thing goes off) that it's a _huge_ convenience to me, particularly as we have expensive packages delivered multiple times per week. As long as I own the data and police don't have default access to it, I'm cool.
Starting a post with a sentence about how you're a paranoid guy and dislike Big Brother and what-not, and then pivoting to spend multiple paragraphs on how you live in a nice neighborhood and don't mind providing data and surveillance on those around you feels more than a little disingenuous.
Despite (because of?) being an Amazon employee, though one who works nowhere near the Ring, I'd never buy a Ring - and I don't exactly think I'm the most "paranoid guy" about "the surveillance state and whatnot".
Isn't the whole point of the article that the corporate-cop partnerships which are budding here seem distinctly dystopian? Why post all of these positive aspects which -- ostensibly -- exist in competitors (Arlo, maybe?) without the shady downside?
That said, since it is data in the hands of a third party, if the police really wanted that footage, they could issue a search warrant on Ring, and compel them to turn it over, just like they could compel you to turn over your footage with a subpoena or search warrant.
> Ring will only provide video content in response to a valid search warrant or with the verified consent of the account owner.
>https://support.ring.com/hc/en-us/articles/360001318523-Law-...
Yes, they do. Ring lets the police know that video evidence exists, and with that information, police can get a warrant for it.
It's hard to get a warrant for data when the police don't know it even exists, and it's even harder to get data that might not exist when it's you who decides the retention policy, and not Amazon.
I wish more people gave it crappy information/address.
> police don't have default access to it, I'm cool.
That's the only thing that concerns me. Why are people up in arms about this? I mean if it deters people from stealing from you, that's a good thing also it's not pointed inside your house.
Because a citizen walking on the sidewalk doesn't consent to being captured with cameras everywhere they go. We know Amazon and other providers are including face recognition (and I wouldn't be surprised if they are working on other methods like gait recognition, tracking movement across cameras that are near each other etc).
Getting caught in the background of someone's selfie is one thing, mass surveillance by a mega-company and collaboration with the government/police is another. I should be able to go out in public without being tracked without my consent.
That's not even getting into data leaks, police corruption, and NSA style surveillance programs that this footage is inevitably going to get caught up in.
In the US they do. They're in public. It's photographers rights.
To be clear, I'm not against IoT devices but at least my Echo only listens to the sounds in the bathroom. That only affects me not everyone in my neighborhood. Video doorbells don't seem worth the loss in privacy just to get a packaged protected that Amazon will replace for free anyway.
And my Ring will only start recording if someone is on my front porch (I have the range turned all the way down, with only the central zone recording [out of left/right/center]).
I don't know why that's invasive towards anyone who isn't trying to steal packages off my front porch. You won't show up on a recording unless you're on my property.
Maybe it's worth pointing out that I live in the suburbs and have a large front yard - I do understand your point for someone in an urban area who would theoretically be recording near-constantly as people walk by. But in this case, no one's showing up who isn't in my yard.
That being said we've had surveillance systems for ages and no one's ever thought about them, but I definitely get why people are nervous in some situations.
I kind of alluded to this but I even questioned my own ethics for a while with this thing. I lambast people for trading convenience for security or privacy all the time - the justification I give for having this myself is that a) it's not in my home (so I don't consider it a personal invasion), and b) it's restrained to my front porch and yard (so I don't consider it a public invasion).
Again, I can see why others would question my logic here.
Everything else, to me, can be boiled down to the fact that the author is uncomfortable with the tradeoffs people are making between privacy and security. The author engages with this point only in passing, at the very end of the piece: "But for ordinary people, like those in Northwest Baltimore, the reason for trusting Ring is simple: they are scared. Pastor Moore said that he understands concerns that people have about Ring’s use of data. However, he said his community didn’t share these concerns."
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/43kga3/amazon-is-coaching...
In that case, I don’t see any reason it’s different than a closed loop system.
In general, people bought the device to collect this data (for their own use).
When I was driving for GrubHub last year in LA, I'd say about 1 in 10 Ring doorbells actually worked.
Surveillance sucks.
There's also a feature that allows people to choose to share recordings publicly. To most users these things are features, not bugs.
Obviously aspects like "black people getting reported as suspicious" is unwelcome, but this isn't a problem with Ring/cameras. I presume the people clicking the suspicious button are the same people traditionally calling in 'tips' whenever they spot somebody with a tan. (Or if you're in the middle of Baltimore it's black residents reporting black people being suspicious). But - I've no real idea/evidence, so I'll leave that.
What did appear to be deliberately misconstrued, was the police being directed to reach out on social media to their residents, to improve residents opting in to share their footage.
If "the government" asks me to provide a video-feed, my hackles would go up. If your local cop says "I'm trying to reduce crime near you and your footage would help me" - well.. am I going to tell them I'm not going to help?
Of broader interest: the neighbor agreed to "help" and your family's movements are henceforth subject to surveillance without consent.
Wouldn't want the camera in my home, or pointed at me whilst I work - but I'm OK with "me walking by"
Basically, I've accepted the neighbour is already allowed to see me as I walk by - this is just improving the efficiency of surveillance, not changing it. I wouldn't have objected if they'd decided they wanted to start an old-school "twitching curtains" neighbourhood watch scheme - I might not have joined, but I wouldn't be feeling violates.
1) A weapon, like a gun 2) a camera
Sure, we have the police, but by the time they arrive, it's usually after the fact and not easy to actually catch the person that did it.
Many countries, like Australia and England, have terrible gun rights, but essentially have turned into a surveillance state in its place, with the number cameras. It puts the fear into thieves because they know they will most likely be caught.
If you reject both, it will only result in more innocent people getting hurt or killed and crimes going unsolved.
I have ring cameras inside and outside my house. A group of 3 people broke into my house while I was on vacation. They saw the camera inside, and ran out of the window they broke through.
Nothing was taken, but if I didn't have the cameras, something would have been taken. On top of everything, this all happened about 5 minutes before my brother-in-law came back home for the night.
Cameras have also shown us all sorts of crime we would never have known: package thieves, trespassing, and just a better general awareness we never had before.
A society where everyone and their mother is holding guns (and have cameras) doesn't seem ideal to me. Reminds me of this cartoon: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFmrZp92QTQ
I don't see this is true. There is few cameras in Germany and even fewer historically, while there is still pretty strict gun laws and the vast majority of the population does not own a gun. What's not rampant, however, is violent home invasions. Sure, non-violent burglaries are on another card, but that's just stuff, and often insured stuff. Even then, "pro" burglars long adapted to cameras (wear masks) and stuff like fingerprinting (wear gloves). What they didn't fully adapt to yet is that nice little spying device called their own mobile phone.
I guess it depends on where you live. If you live in a place full of irrational tweekers, failed by society, who are out of their mind, looking for a quick score to fuel their drug habit, who don't mind getting extremely violent...
But if you just have "regular" burglars around, they will try to avoid other people, and even if they break in while somebody is at home, they will most often fuck off real quick because a confrontation does not only put the home owner at risk, it also puts THEM at risk (a home homer coming at your burglar ass with a huge kitchen knife is still something you will want to avoid). At least our local burglars will fuck off when they notice somebody is at home.
Please cite some evidence that doorbell cameras have a causal impact on crime rates. Or guns for that matter. I doubt there's anything compelling. There's probably a small marginal effect, but there are bigger levers we can turn. The way to actually help people not get hurt is to make it so that fewer people want to do crime. (Which, BTW, we've been doing a pretty bang up job of the last thirty to forty years! Good news!)
There were increasing reports of burglaries in my neighborhood and one night my home was broken into while we were there sleeping. I installed a Ring camera the next weekend and was awakened to the world of my little cul-de-sac on an average night. There were generally multiple cars coming in, looping around, and leaving in the early-a.m. hours. But it lights up bright and immediately whenever someone comes back there, and in a matter of about two weeks, this dwindled down to absolutely no traffic. Now if I see an entry at 2:00am in my log, it's almost certainly an opossum video.
What I can tell you is our cameras have assisted both us and police (via my consent) to identify a group of individuals who were breaking into cars in our neighborhood. Word will eventually get around that my neighborhood has cameras and people who are watching. That's a powerful deterrent.
People are scared, and being scared, want to do something - and going through baggage checks, installing cameras, scanners, pat downs - well that all feels like doing something. Of course, it's not really, it's theater.
My neighbors have posted many reasonably clear, useful images of break-ins and shared them with the police. It has done no actual good - no items recovered, no perpetrators dissuaded.
Footage does nothing to deter people and it has no consequences. It can only be used against the interest of common people - because stopping crime does not lead to meaningful profit. Selling security devices to folks, charging per the hour for security checkpoints, selling x-ray machines, well, that's very profitable - but you can't do those things when nobody is concerned. Harvesting data, selling facial profiles - again, profitable, extremely so.
You mean giving up my ability to defend myself with a gun (many want to remove the rights of law abiding citizens) or use a camera to catch potential criminals (what you are proposing here in your comments)?
Like I said, I have cameras in my house and have already prevented at least a couple of crimes. It has made me safer for sure.
"well that all feels like doing something. Of course, it's not really, it's theater."
We haven't had a major attack in the US since 9/11. It's really almost impossible to prove what someone would have done without the security and decided against it.
People should defend their liberties, whether that's a right to privacy or a right to own firearms. Having a camera is not de facto bad - but having a camera whose data is controlled by a for-profit company is a shift away from liberty.
We have the freedom to choose a company like Ring/Amazon. It's not forced on us by the government.
"We didn't have a major terror attack in the US using airplanes before 9/11 either"
We also didn't have the terrorists with that level of sophistication. We still do today. Increased security definitely has a role in a decrease of terror attacks, but how much or how little would be needed to maintain this level? That much is unknown.
Remember that the people selling you security are not reliable indicators of truth. They are profiteers - and you are the one they profit from.
You can choose to do business with Amazon - but you can't choose if their cameras record you or if your facial profile gets added to their services. You don't get to object when the fed subpeonas AWS for that info because you don't get standing. You are not the consumer, you are the product.
We aren't talking about profiting from terrorists. We are talking about the idea of increased security making you safer from terrorists.
I suppose by this thinking, we should get rid of most firewalls, 2FA, and password managers because it won't actually make you safer.
Good safety practices are generally not convenient. It sounds like most people don't want the hassle of dealing with inconveniences at the airport, which will make them safer.
"Remember that the people selling you security are not reliable indicators of truth. They are profiteers - and you are the one they profit from."
I installed cameras because there were breakins in my neighborhood..and it paid off. Not only did I catch thieves in my house, I was able to give the footage to the police. Many of my neighbors have caught people breaking into cars and people trespassing on their property after midnight.
"but you can't choose if their cameras record you or if your facial profile gets added to their services. You don't get to object when the fed subpeonas AWS for that info because you don't get standing. You are not the consumer, you are the product."
You can trot out this cliche, but it doesn't make it true. I'm the consumer..and it's not like any of these other ring cameras (besides the ones I installed myself) are pointing inside my house. My neighbors all have cameras and it only records public space.
I have no problem with this. I have no expectation of privacy when I'm out in public and neither should you.
Nobody cares when your neighbor captures you leaving your house, or the local coffee house records you buying breakfast. When someone can see all the cameras though then they can do things like map out your day or make a list of your contacts - things which are not public and are privacy invasive.
And yes, AWS is capturing facial data and storing it - and providing the tools for others to do it cheaply. I got to play with their toolkit yesterday and it was trivially easy.
It is not about convenience - it is about your right to do things the government doesn't like freely. The government doesn't care for activists, whistleblowers or protestors - and it has and will abuse it's power to attack them.
You should have a problem with this. You should have a problem with for profit companies building profiles on your children. You should be upset when your human rights are curtailed under the lie of security. Humans were not meant to be farm animals for corporate consumption.
[1] https://nest.com
[2] https://store.google.com/us/category/connected_home
[3] https://store.google.com/us/product/nest_hello_doorbell
A "smart doorbell" with a camera is a surveillance device.
Listen to older podcast episodes on Twist: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puP_D3k7vVI
Kudos on the title for that reason alone.
As long as this camera is networked, it can call-home via wireless or wired network, even though you disabled its cloud service.
Should I be embarrassed?
You can roll your own home server and home network, but then you're responsible for maintaining and upgrading (and, most importantly, securing) it.
Still a cool data structure though