Ask HN: What is the best privacy-focused video doorbell? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: What is the best privacy-focused video doorbell?

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So the family have decided they "need" a video doorbell... with calls for a Ring Doorbell. I don't want more Amazon/tracking/spyware installed so looking for the best privacy focussed doorbell (Ideally with open APIs).

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I don't have experience with video doorbells, but a pattern I use to find IoT devices is look at the Home Assistant integrations[1] for moderately open APIs, then drill down into each product to find one with "Local Polling" or "Local Push" for the classification, which means you can communicate with the device over LAN instead of only via cloud. More on that here[2]. Currently the only listed doorbell with a local option is DoorBird[3]. Note it's not exhaustive as I know there's at least one product I have that could be Local Polling but the current implementation is Cloud Polling.

[1]: https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/#doorbell

[2]: https://www.home-assistant.io/blog/2016/02/12/classifying-th...

[3]: https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/doorbird/

I’ve been very happy with Ubiquiti’s Unifi Protect doorbell. It does mean having to buy into their whole ecosystem, but I was already most of the way there when I added the doorbell and a couple 4k cameras.

Recording to a local device does mean you have to consider things like power/network outages if you want remote access and recording to continue during those events. I’ve got all my network gear and the doorbell transformer running off a UPS to cover the time between a power outage and my whole-home generator kicking in. I’ve also got an LTE modem to fail over to on my Dream Machine Pro (Router/network controller/video storage).

Did you just lay out a clear blueprint of your security system in the internet? Hope you agree that s not a good idea.

Security through obscurity hasn't been a good idea for a while either, to be fair

At least he has one.. you could jimmy open my front door and walk in without any electronics recording you

Full disclosure though, if you do that while my wife and kid are home I will stab you

I’ve divulged my camera & network setup. Sure, you could use that info to sneak up to my house, turn the gas off to my generator, cut the power, wait 3h for the batteries in my UPS to run out….

Or you could walk up and smash a window wearing a balaclava.

Just convinced a neighbor to ditch Ring for the UniFi Protect ecosystem. They’ve been happy with it. I’m also happy to not have my neighbor donate my MAC addresses, face and voice to Amazon inadvertently.

Until UI gets acquired by a megaco, which I suspect is what they're trying to do with their recent reduction of personnel and costs.

I wouldn't be surprised if one of the FAANGs acquires them. They have a fairly popular home line now with Amplifi, and that seems to be their main/only focus, now that almost all of the EdgeOS engineers are reportedly gone.

And you are free to grab the rtsp and do what ever you want to. Most systems like home assistant and co will happily integrate with that.

I have the Unifi Protect doorbell and like it a lot.

But the big decision point is whether you want to get stuck in the Unifi Protect walled garden. A lot of people understandably don't want that.

Back in the days of Unifi Video, you could create your own NVR using Unifi's software, but you can't with Unifi Protect. I've already outgrown my Unifi Cloud Key Gen 2+ (which is only doing NVR duties). Scrubbing through footage in a browser or mobile device can be a royal pain.

If you have a significant number of cameras, you need to invest in one of the more powerful Unifi NVRs to get better performance.

Wasn't Ubiquiti shown to have a number of backdoors in past couple years?

Yes, that is true, but all of them are built on top of their cloud integration which is optional. If you did not utilize their cloud integration and disable remote administration (it's off by default), you are basically equally at risk as any other "Linux" box on the Internet based on the versions of software running on the device.

I've just ordered an Amcrest AD410. It has RTSP support! I handle my video footage through https://frigate.video hooked into Home Assistant, and the Amcrest cameras are pretty open and compatible with this setup, apparently. They have a (somewhat hidden) API, with some open source solutions like https://github.com/dchesterton/amcrest2mqtt about which expose it to more common standards, and Home Assistant has an official integration for them too.

I've been really happy with my Frigate setup and previously wrote a few words about the switch: https://senryu.pub/afternoonrobot/articles/replacing-unifi-v.... It has taken me ages to find a viable doorbell, however, which is why I've only just ordered the AD410. I'm pretty hopeful for it, and a colleague already has one and really likes it.

So someone rings your door bell, can you grab your phone, click on the notification, and talk to them?

Probably not, but I don’t have a need for that - I’m really just after the video and notifications. I imagine it could be possible with some hacking but I haven’t got it yet.

Wow. Thanks for posting about Frigate - that looks amazing. Just getting into Home Assistant and have been struggling with the video stuff but this looks like it will simplify a bunch of stuff.

Just subscribed to your blog in the hope you do another write-up about the Amcrest camera!

Ooh thanks! Yeah Frigate is fantastic and has saved me so much hassle. The Coral device is pretty much a requirement for performance but it does work really well :D

I’ll definitely be writing up a few more things soon! I tend to go through bursts of sorting my Home Assistant stuff out.

Ring is absolutely a shame, when it comes to privacy. Following, it comes with a monthly fee if you need video recordings.

We had critical situation at home, so we also decided to set up a recording camera. Brand name is “Eufy”. Yes, you need to register an account to watch the streams, however recordings are stored on a sd card. They also offer door bells, which require a gateway, which then stores all the recordings. Eufy adversites it’s products for being secure and private, however… I just think everything comes with a price and Eufy offers a fair trade between privacy and comfortabity/usability.

So for me: Ring is a no-go and I’m not willing to set up and maintain a homebrew-solution.

I'm not sure whether the doorbell uses the same Tuya platform as their vacuum cleaners do, but if they do then there's a major vulnerability there - essentially all their Tuya-based devices can be accessed by knowing just a (sequential) ID.

Thanks for the advice. Do you have some sources?

This GitHub issue describes how the official Eufy app talks to Tuya: https://github.com/mitchellrj/eufy_robovac/issues/1 - you see that once you get your Tuya User ID from the Eufy API, the actual password to talk to Tuya is actually hardcoded and the same for every user.

I've got some code that implements the "request signature" mechanism (the missing piece of the puzzle in the above issue) that might make this more obvious - you'll notice that the TuyaAPISession class only takes a username (the aforementioned sequential ID) and country code, no password (as it's hardcoded and the same for everyone): https://gitlab.com/Rjevski/eufy-device-id-and-local-key-grab...

Eufy is my choice as well. They seem to be the only privacy focused video doorbell out there

> the family have decided

Think very carefully here. If you want a video doorbell, your personal requirements are very different from the requirements that your family has.

I'm very happy with my Nest doorbell, but to be quite honest, the only "privacy" thing I did was tell all my neighbors who are within view of the camera. If / when there are concerns, I'll disconnect it. (Frankly, my neighbors just laughed and then put in video doorbells pointing at my house.)

Assuming your family are average people who aren't excited about hacking and tinkering, it's not worth pushing a homegrown or niche solution on them unless it's brain-dead easy to use.

I’m curious to learn why people buy these things.

Crime rate where I live is low. Regardless that’s what insurance is for. And I’m not even sure if the doorbell would deter anyone.

Even in a large house I don’t mind coming to the front door to answer the rare unexpected visitor.

That leaves keeping delivery people honest and not throwing deliveries. But again I haven’t had that problem and if I did that’s what the return process is for.

Are these the reasons and I’m just clearly not the target market. If so how are you different that it’s an important purchase to make?

Thanks for sharing your perspectives.

"Regardless that’s what insurance is for."

Wot?!? It appears you've never experienced the feeling that someone was in your house, your bedroom and went through your stuff - perhaps even while you were home... Money cannot fix everything. It can help, but the creepy feeling that your home is no longer private cannot be repaired...

Totally agree. Had a couple of local drunkards come through an unlocked window to steal things years ago and could never shake the creepy factor. Broke the lease and moved early a couple weeks later.

Yes, that sucks. I agree. But, the video doorbell doesn't help with drunks coming in a side/basement window. I understand an array of cameras around the house to cover your example. So, maybe the doorbell video is just one part of the solution--that makes sense. Only having a doorbell video to my earlier question doesn't seem to provide any value.

True, but I want to add that step 1 is lock the windows and doors. No single solution is a cover-all. We have to start with the most basic things, which are usually already installed (locks, blinds, etc).

In Texas, we say that feeling is what guns and dogs are for. (note: if you go too far down the rabbit hole on the former, the government may impolitely take care of the latter.)

That's a path with no end, with one security gadget begetting another. Today it's video doorbells, then some CCTV, maybe hidden cameras in every room, and eventually laser trip wires and touch sensors.

You're probably better off looking for the root cause of why you've got that creepy feeling in the first place.

>You're probably better off looking for the root cause of why you've got that creepy feeling in the first place.

I think because someone broke into their house?

My house was broken into about 10 years ago, and I don't have this feeling. Meanwhile, I know someone who does have this feeling and hasn't been burgled. So, the two don't necessarily correlate.

In general, the perception of crime rates are often very out of sync with actual crime rates.

As someone who was burglarized a few years ago, the things that could be replaced was the worst of my worries. My safe deposit box that had notes and sentimental gifts from people that have passed away were taken. My home had been invaded and my sense of security was gone. I couldn't sleep there for weeks and ended up moving shortly after

That's very unfortunate, I'm sorry.

I am not sure though, if a video doorbell would have prevented the break-in. (I am not in the US and I know no one with a video doorbell).

You are right. I haven’t. I did have my car broken into and the police shared with me the tactics that criminals use and a door bell camera or even cameras wouldn’t deter the pros. And the ones that aren’t pros I wonder if they are too stupid to even notice a doorbell camera.

... or experienced the fine print and hassel of dealing with insurance. Plus, some things can't be replaced. Not to mention, this attitude can lead to higher premiums.

I work from home and also live in a neighborhood with lots of door to door salesmen. I use a video doorbell to prevent hopping off a meeting just to tell someone I don’t need new windows.

It’s also useful if we are out of town and need a neighbor to grab a delivery.

I would never have one but I think it makes people feel control in a world they have little. One thing people need to remember is that if it is easy for you to view your door step or (worse) house interior, it will be easy for someone else to view that info too. IoT companies are notoriously crap at security (because good security is not convenient). Look at all the hacked baby monitors. Now you add in that anything you buy comes with the ability for the parent company to view that video or give it to the police. People want to "keep an eye" on their house but they miss the collective point that then everyone is watching what you are doing all the time. The next product will be made is video motion lights. When the lights come in, it will start recording. Only after people get caught on camera doing something they wouldn't want recorded will they cry "Privacy!". I don't want to live in 1984 but unfortunately a lot of people feel safer with big brother.

"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety" - Ben Franklin (yeah, I know this quote is misused but it has been co-opted into a new meaning that is relevant)

> The next product will be made is video motion lights.

Do you mean something like the Nest Cam with floodlight?

https://store.google.com/us/product/nest_cam_floodlight

See, I predicted it!! Clearly I don't follow developments in this space, lol.

Personally I also like to know when packages are delivered. Especially because sometimes delivery people ignore instructions and leave the package in a very visible location which makes it prone to theft. I also appreciate having this when I am out of the house in case someone comes to the door so I have the ability to respond as needed.

I setup a CC camera system around my house to cover all of the entrances.

I’m not purely worried about a break in. It’s a peace of mind thing when something weird happens outside your house, you can find out what it was without having to worry.

Small and simple example: one morning my wife went to leave for work and the side door was open to her minivan. We’ve had cars broken into before when traveling and this definitely put us on alert. We had to check and see what was missing, wonder how they got in, wonder if the car was safe to drive or if they’d taken the garage door opener.

Then we checked the cameras and the door opened by itself about 30 minutes before she walked outside. One of us must have bumped the keys in our pockets. :)

Seeing that on video took something that would have had us worried into something that was no longer a big deal.

Yes great story. I understand the benefit of putting cameras around the perimiter.

Personally I have other projects to tackle first, but could see myself doing that one day. Thank you for the example.

> Crime rate where I live is low. Regardless that’s what insurance is for. And I’m not even sure if the doorbell would deter anyone.

I appreciate your honesty, but whoa is this a loaded comment. A few things to note:

- Crime is deterred greatly by the probability of getting caught. If a criminal were to see that video is constantly be recorder it would likely lessen the chance of crime happening. In theory your crime rate in your neighbor could be low due to other people having this security on their houses (and thus providing an overall deterrent of "this is a bad place to try to burglarize someone because there are cameras everywhere!")

- Insurance premiums are tied to probabilities of crime. Often times insurance companies will offer discounts if you have security mechanisms. Also, lets say someone does burglarize your house, your insurance premiums will go up in the future.

- Lastly and probably the most simple. Why on earth would you ever want to simply rely on insurance as a remediation to your possessions? Can you replace that unique piece of art with money? What if you were injured by a burglar? etc. etc.

Crime rate where I live is incredibly high.

- The people committing the crimes frequently have untreated mental illness or addictions, and do not care about getting caught.

- Even if you have video and/or proof, they will not be prosecuted. If you have, for example, Find my iPhone, the police will not help you retrieve it even if you have high resolution images of the thief and GPS coordinates and can remotely trigger a loud noise on it.

- Insurance premiums are already insanely high regardless.

Same reason I bought a dashcam. "That's what insurance is for" is a LOT easier when you have some kind of video evidence of what happened.

Anecdotal but investigative effort and interest from local police departments feels like it's at an all time low for low level crime like vandalism, package theft, etc. Not really passing judgement, perhaps those departments simply have more important things to do for society, but we might as well fill the gap with technology for now.

Yes, whenever I see a dash cam I stop and think about getting one, I see the value. Especially since the probability of a car accident is far more likely than a B&E through your front door.

Aside from the reason why anyone uses security cameras, they're popular because they're the least disruptive to your home aesthetic. (ie. no wires or obvious cameras at your roofline).

I use mine to keep track of when packages arrive AND to see what my dogs are barking at without having to leave my office. So far it has proven to be a useful tool.

I have a video doorbell for three reasons:

1. Because I want to know when a delivery occurs so I can promptly retrieve the package.

Most of the time delivery staff don't ring/knock or I may not hear in my office, a simple motion detection camera would do this just as well, but a combined device is simply more convenient.

2. To record who enters and leaves my house and when.

Whether it's friends visiting or a home invader, it's important that I have a record of this in case I find myself in a situation where I need this evidence in the future. For better or for worse (and I think for the worse), the mere existence of these devices means lacking this evidence can be incriminating against yourself, so having evidence to support your own case in the future is simply prudent.

3. So I can respond to people without needing to open the door.

There are all sorts of solicitors and others who go around ringing doorbells, and in general I don't want to speak to them at all, but I also find it more expedient to respond. By doing so through the doorbell I don't have to open the door and expose myself to forced entry risk (which unfortunately is commonplace).

The funny thing about insurance is, that there's no insurance that reasonably covers your packages once a confirmed delivery has been made but prior to you retrieving it, and there is also no insurance that covers the results of a home invasion or incorrect (possibly malicious) prosecution, other than possibly replacing non-unique property (after deductible). An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

I like your answer best so far. You have perfectly reasonable uses for the camera, and none just so happen to overlap with things I care about. I'm clearly not the target market.

I did find your third point on solicitors rather interesting. I get so few that often I'm curious to see who is out and about (maybe 1 every 6 months).

> I’m curious to learn why people buy these things.

Psychological coddling. The same reason people put take over their webcams, even though an attacker than has remote code execution on your machine to access it can already steal all your files, records audio and otherwise own you.

"And I’m not even sure if the doorbell would deter anyone."

It's the old there's a bear chasing you and another person - you don't have to be faster than the bear, just faster than the other person.

Many criminals avoid houses with cameras, dogs, security systems, etc. Why go to the extra trouble of dealing with the defenses when some other house doesn't have any? Low hanging fruit...

They aren't even that good. We (unfortunately) have an Amazon doorbell and all it does is play wind chimes constantly as dog walkers go past. On top of that, the one time we had a suspicious person approach our door it didn't even record them, we were left wondering what this guy with a bunch of flowers was doing kneeling down at our lock.

Also I find it hilarious that Amazon deliveries don't even ring the doorbell, they just knock the door, drop the package on the door step, and vanish before you even unlock the door.

Oh, and as for why we got it, some scrote put a brick through our porch door and tried to put one through our front window. We hoped if they tried it again we would capture their face, but we all know criminals wear a uniform that hides identifying features.

Probably overkill for your purposes, but I wanted a wired networked solution that would allow me to synchronize/tile video from other surveillance cameras. I ended up deploying the Ubiquiti door bell as well as their Unifi cameras and the NVR + UDM Pro. Make sure you set it up with a local admin account and disable Unifi Cloud for security reasons. They're expensive, but they work well, and can be powered/connected via wired Ethernet with POE. The doorbell is the only one that's WiFi because it's powered via a standard doorbell transformer, but supports the latest WiFi protocols including WPA3.

I'm sure the setup experience is less easy and seamless than a Nest, but it's more locally controlled, all video is locally recorded not in the cloud, and you get a strong management interface for large footprints.

Would you like to tinker a pi?

googling pi doorbell brings stuff like this

https://makezine.com/projects/remote-camera-doorbell-and-sma...

Logitech would also be much better than amazon at least and provider a better plug and play experience https://www.logitech.com/en-us/products/cameras/circle-view-...

I was going to suggest the same thing. If you build out the device yourself, the privacy is as close to perfect as you can get. Take it up a step by having a dedicated hidden and non-internet connected WiFi network for your doorbell/security systems. A few disks connected to the Pi and one of their cameras should be sufficient. I'm sure there's pre-built cases and button enclosures you could pick up.

Bonus: You can build the device to your local privacy regulation. Where I am, doorbells in shared living spaces can't have audio recording, but good luck finding a decent doorbell that does not also record audio.

Gira have a range of video intercoms and supporting hardware. They are a German company, so everything works offline by default. Not cheap, but it's also not going to be made obsolete in 3 years time. I believe they use SIP under the hood.

https://www.gira.de/produkte/tuersprechanlagen/tuersprechanl...

Problem with Gira is I've never actually figured out how to purchase it as a consumer. The products look amazing, but it seems impossible to buy in the US.

I think that's simply because they don't make 120V models, here in Europe it's easy to find a retailer to buy online.

The eufy (Anker) video security products have worked very well for me and store the video locally. I don’t trust anything consumer oriented, but realistically I also don’t have time to invent my own solutions (nor do I want to maintain them). I can’t guarantee the Eufy cameras are the most secure setup, but the system works well, has a pretty good (above average) iOS app, doesn’t store on the “cloud”. No complaints here.

Netatmo? It records to a local SD card and can push videos via FTP or to Dropbox. No cloud recording or processing involved.

I assume it does have some server that it talks to so that push notifications work, though.

https://www.netatmo.com/en-us/security/doorbell

There are SIP-based solutions, for example: https://www.voipon.co.uk/sip-door-entry-systems-c-1599_587.h... (no affiliation).

The problem with those is that there's still no good open-source ecosystem around SIP. There are ad-hoc libraries that implement the low level protocol, but little when it comes to a full B2BUA to which you can then connect a SIP client.

The closest to that is Asterisk but IMO it's far from user-friendly, has very poor & incomplete documentation, an arcane configuration language and is plagued by lots of legacy telecoms-specific crap (obscure protocols that are no longer used, etc) that the majority of users won't need.

So there is SIP hardware, but then you just moved the problem elsewhere and now you need a user-friendly SIP server to run it.

I thought FREESwitch was the new hotness in PBX software? https://freeswitch.com/

You're not wrong regarding SIP, however, having spent time wrapping my head around it; a SIP video door bell, on a typical /24 residential home network, could simply direct-dial a single computer w/o a SIP server, running MicroSIP (on windows) or Linphone (On Linux). You'd probably have to disable DHCP. If you wanted to connect from multiple devices/computers, then the asterisk setup for that is not TOO bad, it would be a few entries to define the endpoints + passwords, and another few lines to make a call from one ring all the others.

I was thinking more along the lines of replicating the Ring (or other proprietary cloud-based doorbell), which means even if you go through all the effort of configuring Asterisk and have a static IP you'll be exposing Asterisk to the internet which I don't feel too comfortable considering it's a huge pile of legacy C code, or otherwise you'll need to put a VPN gateway in front (and have the mobile client VPN into it) which is even more work.

It's probably overkill for a residential installation, but Grandstream has a SIP-based Audio/Video Keyfob/Keypad door access system. You could skip wiring up the door release mechanism, and just have it make a video call, and it's designed to be outdoors and weathered.

http://www.grandstream.com/products/facility-management/faci...

However, with anything like this for a family, unless they share the same enthusiasm for DIY tech projects, frustrations will occur, and you will be the target of that frustration anytime it doesn't work :(

I think Robin ProLine should fit the bill: https://www.robintele.com/en/products/video-intercoms.html

It should, as it's a totally off-cloud product: supports SIP and RTSP and records video local to SD card. No online services, no monthly payments.

We ended up with the Eufy doorbell. Local storage is what sealed the deal for me. It's not perfect, but it's more than good enough. And there is no monthly subscription.

How do you configure these without a smart phone?

I reckon regardless of product, you should block it at the router/firewall/pinhole level so it can’t communicate out to the internet.

While commenting - any that are AppleKit or "Home Assistant" compatible? I've been looking for the same OP - thanks for asking.

I don't have one myself but I do like Eufy. I have a few security cameras by them and they store everything locally + still work fine when I block them from communicating outside the local network

Wyze and Eufy are so funny. Parallel companies slowly crawling towards remaking every consumer electronic device, but cheaper and better.

Thank you so much as well

I use the Netatmo Video Doorbell for their Homekit integration. Doesn't support HKSV yet but it's due "soon".

Thank you - HomeKit integration is great.

https://www.robin.nl/en/shop/proline-homekit.html

Thank you so much.

https://www.logitech.com/en-us/products/cameras/circle-view-...

Works with HomeKit. No need to deal with Logitech except for initial set up as far as I can tell.

I'm not even sure it matters at this point. Most houses in my neighborhood have a doorbell or some kind of camera. What I use doesn't matter since all the other houses are recording me. You might as well just buy the one that has the price and features you need.

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Newhouse-Hardware-All-Purpose-Wi...

I have August, which is "better" but not offline either. Was a good compromise for me.

Dahua VTO2202F It doesn't connect to the cloud and you can isolate it in a VLAN.

https://kleypot.com/fully-offline-video-doorbell-for-home-as...

A camera wired to a monitor & a classical doorbell - for u asked ;-)

I have checked all the links so far and none of the manufacturers show where these products are made. I think when it comes to security that is quite crucial information. Why do they hide where they make these products?

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