Hacker News Reader

Comment by MisterTea | Hacker News Reader

Those rings certainly paid for themselves in stopping the violent break in... oh. well the woman screaming for help was saved when... oh. Well how about... never mind.

Ring, and CCTV in general doesn't prevent or even deter crimes nor did it save anyone. The irony with how useless a Ring camera is, is illustrated in all those Amazon package thefts ring captures but didn't stop. The only useful thing is being able to prove to Amazon your package was stolen. A pointless system of waste for lazy people. Boon for the surveillance state.

View on HN

My Nest Hello (Google's knockoff of the Ring) fits into my home security plan in a few ways.

1. It tells me who is at the door when I'm home and lets me see their face. If it's a good friend I can just tell them to let themselves in, if it's a marketer I can ignore it, etc. This is somewhat just convenience compared to a peephole.

2. It tells me who is at the door when I'm not home. I can let me friends know to come back, if it's a neighbor I can let them know I'll catch up with them later, etc.

3. It lets me keep an eye on packages when I'm traveling. I can ask whoever is house sitting to swing by if there's a buildup of them (which in turn hides that I'm away).

4. It lets me confirm that my pet sitter is indeed swinging by. Sure they could text me every time, but it's easy for people to forget that and it's a hassle for the sitter.

5. When things go wrong, it helps me identify the culprits and circulate those pictures. That may not do much in all circumstances, but at the very least it lets me pass on useful information to my neighbors.

The way I see it, they're a tool, part of a bigger picture that aids in security and safety. The issue it seems is that there isn't a proper follow up once the perpetrator gets identified and caught. There doesn't seem to be strict enough punishment for people who get caught to deter them. Or you have ridiculous laws where the thief can sue the owner of the house they broke into because they got hurt or "excessive force" was used to contain them until the police arrive.

The evidence is extremely weak that threat of punishment actually successfully deters crimes of opportunity: https://undark.org/2016/05/16/deterrence-punishments-dont-re...

Some premeditated crimes (e.g. first-degree murder, bribery) can be deterred by threat of punishment, but when people are making the snap-decision to commit a crime of opportunity, they aren't carefully weighing the risk vs reward.

Studies like this always seem to be confined to Western societies (and particularly the US). Other societies seem to be doing just fine with harsh punishments like the death penalty. There are other factors at play here, but having harsh punishments that are actually applied is one factor in the system. In other countries, serial rapists would be executed for instance. I'm not sure that's the case in the US.

Not that I'm recommending we go this route, but Singapore will literally beat you with a big stick, likely permanently handicapping you, for offenses as small as chewing gum. They have remarkably low crime.

Chewing gum is a fine. There’s a lot to be said about caning in Singapore but you’re not going to be caned for chewing gum.

Among developed countries, the US has one of the harshest "justice" systems.

It still has death sentences and the dubious record of an incarceration rate higher than any other country.

It's about how correctly applied those punishments are. Just because it has the death penalty and high incarceration rates doesn't mean that they're being used correctly. For instance, does a serial rapist or serial child molester get the death penalty? In other countries he would. Why do people who were convicted with 100% certainty get put on death row for very long periods of time? People like public shooters and so on. It's a flawed application of the system in the US.

A reasonable way to look at risk is the severity of the outcome multiplied by the probability it will occur. Your link seems to endorse that that kind of risk acts as a deterrent when sufficiently large.

If your point is that people (at least those who aren't scientists or statisticians) round small probabilities to zero, then I agree, and it's something that I think people need to be more aware of when considering deterrence or other behavior. However, I don't think you or the article made this point clearly. The article would be so much shorter and simpler if it was condensed down to that one observation.

It's quite reasonable to say that punishment only has an effect when it is clearly linked to an action, but that sounds like a completely different message than saying punishment doesn't work (implicitly assuming it almost never occurs).

>The way I see it, they're a tool, part of a bigger picture that aids in security and safety.

There's a particular rock in the Atlantic off the coast of Europe and East or Ireland that's been carpet bombed with CCTV cameras. Ask anyone who lives there and they'll tell you that they're still waiting for the reduction of petty crime the cameras were supposed to bring. There always seems to be plenty of money to fund more cameras and more surveillance but never any money to fund the Good Old Fashioned Police Work(TM) needed to follow up on all the crime those cameras see.

You're not negating what I wrote, there definitely needs to be a follow up once the perpetrators are identified, not to mention other approaches like funding the police. I'm no fan of the Chinese government, but they do seem to have something going there. Not to mention countries like Singapore, the UAE, etc. where there are harsh punishments, and much better safety overall compared to the US.

Again, it's a tool in the tool box, necessary but perhaps not sufficient.

The Office for National Statistics shows a continual fall in the long term rate of theft for the UK since 1995. From around 11k incidents per year to around 4K. A steady decrease.

Not to mention you can just cut the internet to disable it. I don’t see this preventing any, err, career criminals. You’d be just as effective putting up a fake camera on your porch, and you’d probably be on better terms with the neighbors.

Ironically, Ring's fairly low-key appearance undermines the only value it might actually have - as a deterrent. I suspect you'd be better off with a chunky 7/11-style CCTV camera over your front door.

And if your goal is to actually prevent theft, you wouldn't even need to turn it on. It's the same issue as home security systems: they run all those goofy ads about a crook sitting in your bathtub because there's almost no real use-case. As a deterrent, an ADT sticker provides all the benefits of a security system for about $2. As a reaction, all it does is tell you that someone has stole your electronics and jewelry. It won't get recovered, the crook won't get ID'd if they wore a mask, probably won't get caught even if they didn't, you'll just be notified a bit sooner.

I'm not going to condemn people for getting these products, but only because I think they've been badly and systematically mislead. Products like Ring are sold on the back of an entire narrative of crime, deterrence, and punishment that has essentially no bearing on reality. Crimes against person and property are one of very few issues where I've seen people completely change their position just by seeing accurate data.

> I suspect you'd be better off with a chunky 7/11-style CCTV camera over your front door.

Get one of those outdoors camera covers, and fix somewhere people can easily see. Don't bother with an actual camera.

There is a simple test for when a camera is useful: if you saw something happening on the camera, will you do anything differently? A camera that watches some hidden corner near your front door that lets you decide not to go in there right now can be useful (but then, getting rid of the corner is much better).

Why does Amazon care if your package got stolen? Isn't it your problem once it hits your door? Never thought about this I guess

It threatens their business if customers aren't comfortable having products delivered at home.

But obviously it's a new revenue stream with myriad additional business opportunities for Amazon to capitalize on the paranoia of its customers WRT having their packages stolen, to sell surveillance products to them (and access to law enforcement, ad/marketing interests, etc.).

No it isn't unless it's signed for. Even if a video / photo is taken that doesn't prove the person taking the photo took the package afterwards.

The drivers are not always malicious either. Sometimes it's bad training and/or user experience on their equipment.

I had several packages delivered which were "signed" for by someone named "through the letterbox". Similarly, one package said dropped off at the door/porch but no sign of it so I asked for a refund as I assumed it's been stolen... 2 days later my neighbour gives it to me because it was actually delivered to them, but the delivery person couldn't select the proper option to let me know so I had no idea.

My delivery status with Amazon is frequently something along the lines of "left in the mail room". I live in a free standing single family home in a neighborhood where every one has their own mail boxes.

They don't actually care. They usually eat the cost and send you another one. I guess it's cheaper than the cost of requiring signatures, at least once we're constrained to the subset of the population who can order things online.

I bet someone identified this as a substantial line item that was trending up and they want to push Rings out into the world to try to deter future growth and losses. Who knows... the acquisition might have paid for itself in cost savings.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com