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Comment by unfocused | Hacker News Reader

My next door neighbor (we share a wall) had their bicycles stolen twice, so they installed Ring (floodlight) cameras in both the backyard and the front porch. After a year, the cameras have yielded no added security, or caught any "bad guys" as far as I can tell and from what they told me.

What I realized, is they use it to keep track of their kids, funny cat videos that trigger the recording, and most importantly, as a 2 way radio to talk or listen to the kids. That last point, well, I found out they can also listen to my conversations an my kids.

I asked them to point their front porch camera so that it doesn't record my front driveway, just theirs. and they lost their shit. They confirmed they record audio and video. They asked if there was a problem. I said no problem with them. I'm not comfortable with the audio/video recording me or my friends conversations if company comes over to talk to me on my porch or driveway.

I really didn't need to tell them anything, it's self evident why someone wants a camera point away. Needless to say, after I asked them in the winter, one of them refuses to speak to me and crosses the street and avoids me.

These people use surveillance to supervise their kids, and don't care about the fact that their neighbors (me) could be recorded, and they could be hacked or footage access by random people, because Amazon isn't exactly the king of privacy.

I believe these cameras haven't decreased crime. They also don't really add more security. It's a shame though they are everywhere, with disregard for privacy right on people's property. So yes, I'm biased. I have no love for Ring.

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I live in a block-long grouping of condos in Brooklyn. Every so often the management company sends out exterminators and one day as I was talking to him he pointed to these environmental monitors installed on a lamppost on our block. He says “what’s with that, the government spying on us?” and I explained it’s just some environmental data collectors, but pointed to my neighbor’s Ring and mentioned “although that thing records me every time I enter or leave my condo”. He said “oh, I have one of those, it’s great”. He didn’t think there was anything wrong with the fact that Amazon was sharing the videos with law enforcement without consent. The cognitive dissonance was maddening but not at all surprising.

I hope you let him know about Amazon's stellar privacy?

Or that they are in cahoots with "The Government" and will gladly share any and all data through back channels because AWS has very freaking lucrative contracts with them.

Or if you live in a two-party consent state that you don't consent. That should be enough. Someone that doesn't respect your consent doesn't respect you.

The recording as I understand it would still be illegal in a one-party consent state. Conversations that OP has in their house with their guests and/or children are being recorded by none of: OP, OP's guests, or OP's children. It seems to be very sketchy what they're doing.

The difference is that one of those things has a benefit. When there's a mysterious box that does some vague thing that you don't care about, it's safe to hate it. It's not helping you in any observable way, so opposing its existence is a safe, easy decision. But the Ring camera is providing him with a benefit, so evaluating whether to oppose it requires putting a cost on "spying on us" and weighing that against the personal benefits, which takes up a lot of mental load and consideration, so we ignore the vague costs against the concrete benefits.

People often care about these sorts of high level, idealistic concerns like "privacy" and "freedom" right until you offer them the smallest "concrete" benefit. Look at 23andme. Hey, can we take your blood, analyze your DNA, and send it to the police? No? What if we also told you what percentage Western European you are, would that convince you to pay us for the service?

"When there's a mysterious box that does some vague thing that you don't care about, it's safe to hate it. It's not helping you in any observable way, so opposing its existence is a safe, easy decision"

This sounds like the justification of stupidity. If you don't know what it does it ignoring may or may not be safe. If you can't observe a benefit to you (I assume you mean obvious and causual observation) doesn't mean it doesn't benefit you.

It's like you've codified ignorance to make it sound reasonable. This is the same level of thought my cat uses to interact with the world.

Maybe I'm wrong, but it sounds like the OP is not justifying such a view, but explaining how others tend to see things in general.

You are clearly not wrong.

It doesn't seem like because he's describing it directly and offering no criticism.

He also says " so we ignore the vague costs against the concrete benefits."

Which implies him and people like him or around him. Normally if someone wanted to indicate that they would say "some people think.." or "in their world/mind"

You're reading too much into the use of the royal "we" here.

> This sounds like the justification of stupidity.

Doesn't read that way at all to me. Reads like a very accurate depiction of reality.

I didn't claim otherwise

I didn't read it as justifying the stupidity, but explaining why people feel OK engaging in it. It came across as a good explanation of why so many people are so happily thoughtless.

“Thinking is hard work. That may be the reason so few engage in it.”—Henry Ford

Henry Ford is someone I would never consider a great thinker.

He explained himself well.

"Any man can learn anything he will, but no man can teach except to those who want to learn." - Henry Ford

It's open to interpretation but the poster said

" so we ignore the vague costs against the concrete benefits."

At the end of the first paragraph. He could mean "we" as in people though. He also didn't qualify the statement with something like "Some people.." "Many think..". Finally he offers no criticism of why it may be bad to think like this.

However, you're right and reading it now after the comments people made makes that seem more of a possibility than when I first read it.

Human minds navigate the world through heuristics; applying logic is an exhausting method that - for most people - must be reserved so it's available for high-leverage situations.

It's explainable by looking at polls for how Americans feel about major institutions. Gallup did one for various public and private institutions: https://news.gallup.com/poll/394283/confidence-institutions-... and what they found is the only two major institutions that maintain a universal (across political affiliation and other demos) positive trust rating are small businesses and the military. Everybody else either varies a lot or just has universal low trust.

You'll note from this source that "big technology companies" score above all 3 branches of the federal government. Part of this is how partisan politics has become, so one party will have a majority of people expressing trust in an institution their party controls, the other hardly anybody, resulting in a fairly low score for the presidency and supreme court. Congress, it seems, is so universally despised it doesn't matter who controls it, it sits at single digit trust percentage.

In light of this it becomes understandable why somebody would be fine with big tech spying on them at the behest of the police (another institution with pretty high universal trust, though it does vary depending on political affiliation a bit it's considerably higher than any federal institutions), yet react with suspicion from something set up by bureaucrats from a federal agency.

When Democrats think of Congress they think Lauren Bobert/Mitch McConnell.

When Republicans think of Congress they think Nancy Pelosi / AOC.

That's how congress gets low ratings

And also how "my representative" consistently get scored highly on the same surveys.

I feel the same way whenever people freak out about smart speakers, laptop webcams and doorbells – but have had a smartphone (with microphone, camera, GPS, OTA updates and unrestricted up/down connectivity) on them 24x7 since 2008.

The camera may be acting as a deterrent (if they didn't have any additional thefts) without it being obvious.

I never would give a neighbor a hard time about a camera pointing at a publicly visible spot on my property- just into windows and other semi-private locations. That includes both audio and video. I ascribe to the "it's legal for journalists to go through your trash, so if you want privacy, shred your trash first" philosophy.

I added a new camera that includes the school across the street and if the cops come by and ask for footage, I generally provide it (they asked for a breakin across the street, but my camera wasn't pointed there).

One important details is that I buy fairly generic cameras that aren't talking to the outside world/cloud services although it's still a risk.

> I never would give a neighbor a hard time about a camera pointing at a publicly visible spot on my property

In Germany people have successfully sued their neighbours for that and I fully agree with the courts. Filming others without consent is invasive.

In the US you don't have any expectation of privacy in public (or at least severely limited) and the courts have upheld again and again that recording public areas, even from a private area, is completely find. Some jurisdictions require notification or consent for audio recording, but not all.

I find it really unfortunate that the US is so blatantly disregarding data privacy. In a world of eroding freedom, lack of data privacy can become a severe safety risk. The return of the Taliban in Afghanistan, the reversal of Roe v. Wade and Russia's recent moves give me an idea of dynamics that can turn dark quickly.

RvW is an interesting point here - I routinely saw people camped out recording every entry point of a Planned Parenthood for example, including separate cameras pointed lower to capture licence plates. I'm assuming they later post these online or run some kind of ALPR on it for harassment.

Yup, and the same people are outraged that people are posting home address details of Supreme Court Justices. The same court that ruled it was legal to post the home address of obstetricians so people could protest in front of their homes.

People and companies in US don't know what 'privacy' means. All software companies (maybe except Apple), car companies (especially Tesla), telecoms, etc. just collect huge amounts of customer data not giving a damn about consent.

A US law is shaped by what we think is

1) acceptable behavior

2) enforceable, practically

I think video recording laws are largely influenced by 2).

I can angle my Ring camera to my smoking hot neighbor so I can record her doing yardwork. Creepy AF (breaks rule 1) but at what angle is it not obviously deliberate? Turned 10 degrees toward her lawn? 30?

Point being, I think US recording laws are too liberal but we need a defineable limit for privacy.

Maybe photon distance? Capturing photons traveling further than 30m into the aperture is invasive? (half kidding)

A physical mask that blocks the view to the hot neighbour, but not to your areas of interest would give them some reassurance.

What about the satellites mimicking God watching over everyone?

I am not really fine with with them, but that's another can of worms.

Ok, but what if I am trying to monitor my driveway where I park my vehicle but the hot neighbor's flowers are in the same line of sight just beyond my parking space? It's not always feasible to block a portion of the view without blocking the entire reason for having the camera in the first place.

I think a German court would ask in such cases which has more weight: a) your interest in security, or b) your neighbour's interest in privacy. I think the default is b), but there are cases where a) has more weight, for example if your house was already broken into and you can reasonably explain why this exact angle is crucial for your security. Just catching some flowers in the picture does not make a strong case for b).

From the street photography articles I've read; if you can see it from a public space then its fair game, which I think is reasonable. But in your scenario the camera is on your private home, so most people would expect reasonable privacy from being recorded.

Yes, if it's in public it's fair game thanks to the 1st amendment.

The nextdoor homeowner probably has a right to setup a tripod, a laser pointer (or a similar bright spot light) and point it directly at the neighbor's Ring camera iris.

i would ask my nieghbour if they care about it or not, perhaps make a guest feed if they are agreeable to mutual camera coverage, let them have some opportunity to see what is on camera and where it points

> I can angle my Ring camera to my smoking hot neighbor so I can record her doing yardwork

Probably too late to add that this was a hypothetical, but I'm glad the voting on this indicates how much we despise what's legally allowed.

Who would want to live next to someone after a lawsuit between you? This is a neighbor-relations issue first and foremost.

Sounds like relations between these two neighbors is already pretty bad -- the guy crosses the street to walk on the other side? Because he was asked not to point his security camera at someone else's property? Some people are just... children.

Wait til you see two neighbors arguing about property lines.

At least that I can understand. It has implications on right of way, usage, easements, property values, etc. without even getting into issues of adverse possession (which combined with property value issues can become real trouble).

The line between "please don't point your camera onto my property" - something I would respect as a courtesy regardless of the law - and "I'm going to cross the street not to interact with this person" goes straight through mental illness in my opinion. Normal, stable people do not behave that way.

A lot of "Normal" people are not stable. People are petty, vindictive and childish, to think anything else is just flying in the face of evidence.

Police capture a tremendous amount of data using this theory. But citizens don't have access to that data because it's considered confidential.

this post reads luke a paradox

This is not true; rules vary state to state. In Massachusetts, for example, you cannot "secretly" record others, in public or private.

Putting out the yard sign or one of the stickers that comes with the Ring camera solves the "secrecy" issue.

> In the US you don't have any expectation of privacy in public

It's not clear that "on your property" counts as "in public" in all cases.

Front yard, visible from the street, probably "public" in most jurisdictions. Backyard, or somewhere shielded from view without entering yours or someone else's private property? I would argue that is "private" space that should be protected but it would probably come down to the specific circumstances to be certain.

This is the operational definition I'm working from.

But do you enjoy that people in the US don't have this expectation of privacy? Do you believe those laws could change?

My front door is not a 'public area', not really

You don't have a legal expectation of privacy anywhere visible from public property, including even the inside of your house viewable from a public easement/street.

Because of this, it's legal for someone to point a camera right inside your window or front door. It's also illegal (public indecency) for you to be naked in your own window or open door.

If I set up a telescope to look inside your window most people would call that an invasion of privacy, even if the telescope was set up on public property. Having a high resolution digital camera where images can be zoomed and a very sensitive microphone that can pick up conversations is similar, in my opinion.

in my neck of the woods if your far enough away that someone has to use binoculars or some other artficial means, even eyeglasses, they are breaking the law. you, the one being observed are not at fault.

"naked in your own window or open door. "

That's legal in Canada, or at least the police won't arrest you if you do it in your apartment across from a school.

Mine is; amazon drivers take a snapshot every time they deliver a package (I guess this is proof it's been delivered?). Many people can easily walk up to it, unimpeded. Hell, neighborhood kids run onto my front yard and sit in my trees (get off my lawn!!!). It meets every necessary definition of "public", while still being property that belongs to you.

I live across from a school; hundreds of people see my house exterior for days. I wouldn't apply a different rule to a security camera.

I understand some folks have different privacy standards than me. I'm not asking you to follow my privacy rules, as they are a bit more open about public spaces than many people enjoy.

If somebody wanted me to not point my camera at their driveway, a legal threat would be the absolute worst way to achieve it.

There is a difference between a camera from across the street and a camera from across the driveway.

And obviously a legal threat is a last resort after good-faith questioning.

I am not really sure what your objection is to the comment above yours, because these concerns seem misplaced.

> I understand some folks have different privacy standards than me. I'm not asking you to follow my privacy rules, as they are a bit more open about public spaces than many people enjoy.

Private spaces that are publicly visible do not automatically become public spaces, though.

We're talking about my front yard. I can go on street view and see exactly what everybody else driving by sees. The only change is that they scrub faces and license plates, which I could do using AgentDVR + DeepStack.cc and some scripting.

If you tried pointing a camera over my fence into my backyard, then I start complaining.

> We're talking about my front yard.

Yes, agreed! Your front yard is a private space, even though it is publicly visible. You have every right to afford as much public access to it as you please, but the mere fact that you're the one who has the right to make that decision means it is a private space.

> We're talking about my front yard. I can go on street view and see exactly what everybody else driving by sees. The only change is that they scrub faces and license plates, which I could do using AgentDVR + DeepStack.cc and some scripting.

I think a major difference is that a permanent camera allows documenting who is entering and leaving a house at which times, while street view or driving by do not. Even a nosy neighbour behind the curtains would most probably not be able to gather a complete history.

> a legal threat would be the absolute worst way to achieve it.

I agree, just asking is always a sensible first step, as well as making proactively sure that your camera does not invade anyone's private space, but I can see how that can happen unintendedly.

The neighbor has a catalog of audio recordings of conversations had on the porch 24/7.

Does this school have traffic 24/7 and do you broadcast everything from your front steps via a megaphone (and keep recordings)?

There are many comments here about video/audio recordings from public onto private property however there are various degrees of recording.

If there was a public park across the street from your house and someone setup surveillance-level equipment pointed at your front door, I'm not sure there is a rational judge who would consider this "oh well, they're on public land, nothing we can do here".

Germany's entire threat model, at a cultural level, is 100% different from the US due to differing histories. Germany is concerned about how networks of tattle-tale can be used by fascists to organize oppression. Americans are concerned about how crime flourishes in the unobserved corners of urban environments.

These are both, basically, bogeymen. But the German bogeyman is the Nazis returning and the American bogeyman is the transient murderer.

> These are both, basically, bogeymen. But the German bogeyman is the Nazis returning and the American bogeyman is the transient murderer.

Eastern Germany had another authoritarian surveillance state after the Third Reich. I have no good reason to be confident that it will not happen again. It could as well happen in the US, considering recent history.

An authoritarian surveillance state that is paired with digital surveillance is the grim reality of at least hundreds of millions today and that model seems to be on the rise internationally.

More like billions of people.

Anyone who thinks that the power of the surveillance state won't be abused is naive. The existence of "benign" surveillance hinges on those with power always acting in good faith and never faltering. There are practically zero repercussions for abusing that power, and little to no checks and balances, either.

> It could as well happen in the US

It already has.

It's interesting that Germany makes a distinction between observing and recording images or video, while the US does not. The US does distinguish (typically in state law) between listening and recording. Recording is different from watching/listening. It's reasonably possible to know who is present at any given time, but not possible to know in advance who might hear/see a recording in the future.

I do, however think Germany's law goes a bit too far: as I understand it, use of surveillance cameras on private property without warning signs is illegal even if a person would have to be trespassing to be recorded. I do not think trespassers should enjoy a right to privacy with regard to their trespass.

It's not just about trespassers, it's also about anyone who was invited onto the property that's under surveillance. Guests, workers and contractors who are invited onto the property have a right to know if they're being recorded or not.

Sure, but they can be informed individually.

Yeah, but how do you prove that everyone was informed? It needs at least to happen in written form and at that point, you can just put up a sign.

> US does distinguish (typically in state law) between listening and recording. Recording is different from watching/listening. It's reasonably possible to know who is present at any given time, but not possible to know in advance who might hear/see a recording in the future.

I'm not sure how universal is, and it's not always reasonably possible to know who is listening. You can listen from afar. But I would think most states have eavesdropping laws that include overhearing. Here is an example from my state, Kentucky.

https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/chapter.aspx?id...

This law covers both listening and recording.

In that law, it's specifically by using a device, presumably one that enables the user to hear things their unaided ears could not. The law doesn't cover eavesdropping by being present and undetected using unaided ears.

A similar law could be written to cover viewing using magnified optics; existing laws in the US are usually written in terms of a reasonable expectation of privacy, which is not always clearly defined. I think anything viewable from a public place with an unaided eye would probably not fall under that category.

I heard that when cameras were first invented, some cultures rejected them because they believed they were stealing their souls. Sounds like some silly superstition but I have a feeling that what both them and you are really worried about is the fact that people looking at a photo of you are only seeing a small slice of your "soul" or personhood disconnected from the social interactions that would normally occur if they were looking at you in real life. So it's more a worry about losing control of your influence over how other people perceive you, which is a major part of being human.

The older I get the more superstition makes sense. I used to think older people were superstitious because they were more likely to have existential crises (since they were closer to death) but now that I'm middle aged I've realized that it's because human reason is surprisingly slow and the universe is surprisingly big and there's just too much to work through from first principles.

I've been having a similar change but it's not only about there being too much for us to work out from first principles but also an awareness that human minds seem to have a need to believe things which is orthogonal to knowing the truth or being logical. We don't believe in superstitions and religions because we want to make practical use of that knowledge or because it's the logical conclusion from some reasoning - we do it because the act of believing satisfies some biological need. It's easier to believe things when they're not obviously false but truth isn't really what's important about it.

When I see people saying "You idiot, of course the earth isn't flat!" or "All religions are stupid.", I just think they haven't understood the value of belief, even, or especially, false beliefs.

This whole philosophy of valuing truth and using science and all that is fairly modern and seemingly unnatural. I wonder if it's creating an emotional cost in all the people who rejected emotionally or biologically valuable beliefs in favor of being right.

Your trash analogy doesn’t hold up because trash becomes “public” once it’s on the street which isn’t part of your property. “Publicly visible spot on my property” is a meaningless phrase; it’s still my property, and I’m legally (here at least) allowed to raise an objection to the recording of it.

I can’t and wouldn’t object to someone recoding the sidewalk in front of my house. I can, and absolutely will, object to someone recording my yard. You might not see a distinction but there absolutely is one.

I can't ask the people who drop their kids at the school across the street not to look at my yard, so why would I complain about a camera? Because it's always on and recording? Still not convincing to me. My exterior yard (the part not surrounded by a tall fence) is for everybody to look at. In fact lots of people stop by my house to look at our amazing maple tree and start conversations with us.

I think main differentiator is that an individual human is unlikely to stand in one place just watching for an extended period of time. It actually was very expensive to do that kind of surveillance not that long ago, which is why it was not deployed without a good reason. Camera, on the other hand, is cheap. Individual creep is preferable to a panopticon.

None of these things really bother/worry me. This is mainly a threshold argument- a thing that was hard got easier, but didn't fundamentally change what is possible for a dedicated adversary.

The scale of difference between $25/hr for a human and less than $0.01/day (amortized over the lifespan of the camera/service) changes the economics entirely. The circumstances before and after are paradigmatically different.

How is that not fundamentally different?

1) Human stands there and watches your property. A description of what happened on your property is subject to whether or not people believe this human, and the fallibility of human memory. This human cannot be there 24/7, and must -- at minimum -- break to sleep, acquire food, and use the bathroom. In reality, they'll have many other demands on their time that mean they can't (or won't want to) spend much time watching your property.

2) A connected, always-on recording device that captures what's happening in high definition, 24/7 (assuming it has an IR light; if not, ok, more like 12/7). This becomes an indisputable, permanent record that can be replayed as often as anyone wants, and that most reasonable people would believe, without question, as reflecting what is truly going on.

How are these two things not fundamentally different? This is approaching "definition of fundamental" territory.

Clearly, we have different premises.

Exactly. The high cost of human eyeballs trained on a specific target for long periods of time introduces a negative feedback loop which tames the overreach. Cheap, ubiquitous cameras with virtually unlimited storage eliminates that self-regulating mechanism and degrades the trust between members of a society.

Sorry you are not convinced, but looking and recording are different.

If I hear my neighborhood talking - hearsay

If I record my neighbors talking - admissible evidence

I believe they are both considered hearsay (in U.S. law), and both are admissible depending on the conditions

Would you also be fine with people filming you through your windows? Why not, after all it's visible from a public space with the right angle. And windows are just part of another kind of "fence".

In the end it's private property and that makes it private by default. Nobody can forbid you from looking at it, but imho filming is just as invasive as parking the car there while having greater potential for abuse. Filming has intent that goes farther than just randomly looking around.

I use drapes and shapes to get privacy for my windows. My intent Here is to prevent school shootings and help investigate crimes that occur on my property or my neighbor's property. Definitely not my intent to stare at my neighbors in their private lives and they understand that completely.

How are cameras supposed to prevent school shootings? The best they can do is let you watch cops do nothing as we could see in Texas. Prevention is much more important and much cheaper but that's not done either.

And I don't know why I'd spend money in anticipation of a potential crime in front of my home, donating data to Amazon in the meantime. The police is already tracking phones and using other methods no single camera can match.

>I can, and absolutely will, object to someone recording my yard. You might not see a distinction but there absolutely is one. You certainly can raise an objection but it has no legal weight behind it. Anything that is in public view can be legally filmed. I think there may be some federal prohibitions against filming sensitive government areas though not sure if these have ever been testing in court. Walk around naked in your front yard or in your house in front of an open window you are eligible to be legally (though maybe creepily) filmed.

> “Publicly visible spot on my property” is a meaningless phrase

Indeed, your property or not, it's still a "publicly visible spot", and the creep is legally (in the US at least) allowed to be creepy in this way over your objections

> I can, and absolutely will, object to someone recording my yard.

The creep can, and absolutely will, object to your objections, and be allowed to continue (in the US at least).

Privacy requires constant vigilance, in terms of electing lawmakers.

> if the cops come by and ask for footage, I generally provide it

Yeah, I see nothing wrong with this: The law has to ask you, the owner of the camera, for the footage. No legal process can circumvent your knowledge of the footage request, and you can review the footage prior to handing it over. This is all possible because you made good non-cloud infrastructure decisions.

This is basically how it should work, but the fact that Amazon is a third party means the government can legally compel them separately from you being aware. There's no fix for this: Cloud storage is a critical failure of the design of the Ring system.

It's not illegal for journalists to go through your trash, but can't we have a bar for treating our neighbors that's higher than not being criminals?

On one hand, it bothers me that I can't walk around the block without ending up on a dozen security cameras because everybody has a video doorbell. You can modify the motion and privacy zones to exclude certain areas such as the sidewalk, but I'm willing to bet most people do not do this.

On the other hand, I've personally had success with the police and court systems based on video evidence I could provide from my doorbell camera. Also, previously I had a long-lasting issue with a neighbor at my old house who would get really nasty about my yard and other issues (I suspected old age and mental issues) that completely ended once I put up a security camera to record the area he was doing this from.

If I do end up ever getting more security cameras, my plan is to show my neighbors exactly what angle they're recording and make sure they're OK with it. While I technically have the right to record whatever I want to in my state, I'd rather not make anyone feel uncomfortable. I recently came across a video where someone ended up pointing IR lasers at their neighbor's cameras and it was an effective way to disable the cameras without breaking any laws [1]

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RyYm2UwAaeQ

> You can modify the motion and privacy zones to exclude certain areas such as the sidewalk, but I'm willing to bet most people do not do this.

I have to do that or I get notifications constantly. I told my front cameras to only say something if someone shows up on my front step, or drives into my driveway. I don't want to get a notification every time someone walks down the sidewalk, or when the neighbors get home.

Although honestly, I get lots of notifications for the neighbors anyway. Because they seem to think a 30 foot wide road is narrow and they end up using my driveway regularly when getting into and out of their own. Not really a camera problem though.

Def sounds like shitty behaviour from your neighbours.

In terms of decreasing crime I live in Oakland in a duplex. Downstairs was empty and crooks broke in and stole a bunch of stuff over several hours earlier this year. We only had a camera doorbell for our upstairs unit and I have footage of one of the crooks walking around the corner with a crowbar, seeing the camera and immediately turning around and walking away. The camera was a huge deterrent for them and I believe the only reason our upstairs didn't get broken into where we were fast asleep.

We now have cameras on every door + a floodlight in the backyard.

A middle option could be to install a fake ring camera as a deterrent without the privacy hazards.

You could do that. The cheapest and easiest option is just to get yard signs saying that you are recording 24/7. Nest, Ring, and others sell there. There are plenty of generic ones too. If you want to use video cameras as a deterrent, you need to make sure people think you actually have them.

I sometimes see people with their cameras pretty well hidden. That's not going to work as a deterrent!

I use both strategies. I have an obvious camera on my porch pointed at my front door. I also have a camera hidden in a bush near the opposite side of the porch. Any potential troublemaker turning away from the obvious camera gives me a perfect view of their face from the hidden one.

Good idea on the flood lights have you thought of night vision as well because it can become very difficult to see in low light situation.

what i also suggest is play police radio. nothing scares this demographic than hearing police radio chatter describing what is happening

Shitty behavior how? There is nothing illegal about recordings your neighbors driveway.

There's a difference between illegal and shitty.

Shitty = you ask your neighbour not to point their cameras at your house, and they ignore you. Seems unnecessary.

And so you may have a different opinion of your neighbor. They share a different opinion. Some Karen's think it is shitty for you to park in front of their house on a public street.

I am also no fan of Ring or similar, though the reasons are slightly different. We lost our cat recently, and I went round my neighbourhood knocking/ringing on every door to ask around.

It was a strange experience as around 30% had these ring doorbells. It was unpleasant to know I was being recorded and judged, and often as a result, not answered.

I vowed at that point we would never consider one, if only because I don't agree that everyone should be treated with suspicion by default.

I had two suspicious people come to my door (separate incidents) which resulted in me getting a video doorbell (I'm going to migrate from a cloud one to a closed circuit one).

I've also had two cases of salespeople who didn't understand the phrase "not interested". One escalated to me threatening a trespass call before he left. (This is with No Soliciting signs clearly visible)

I worry my wife would not get the same effect.

How do you judge how suspicious someone is through a video feed?

If it's 90° on a hot summer day and they are wearing a big bulky jacket, that raises eyebrows.

Are they wearing a uniform? If they are pretending to be part of a company and not wearing a uniform, that is suspicious.

What about the time of day? ADT sales people don't knock on my door at 8pm at night.

How are they acting? Are they waiting calmly? Are they checking their pockets or waistline? Are they glancing around seeing if other people are around?

Are they hiding their face?

Did they ignore a no soliciting sign?

Did they walk by and check out the property before approaching the door?

Did they knock on my neighbors door first? Or did they come straight to my door?

Did they park? Where did they park? Was it a company vehicle?

How many people is it? Are those people dressed in a similar way? Are they all standing together or did one of them wander off?

If you don't answer immediately, how do they act? Do they get annoyed and wander off or do they become insistant? Do they escalate to knocking or shouting?

I guess it depends where you live and what experiences you've had so far. Your 'pre-test' probability I guess. I doubt there is much I would see on a video feed that would stop me finding out for myself who they are.

>"It was a strange experience as around 30% had these ring doorbells. It was unpleasant to know I was being recorded and judged, and often as a result, not answered."

Ugh, the idea that these things would be encouraging neighbors to become unneighborly by using Ring cameras as screening devices is truly dystopian. Helping neighbors with pets that have gone astray seems like one of the most basic neighborly and and potentially reciprocal interactions. I really hope you found your cat. I agree with commenter above that the prime utility of these for Amazon is as a form of delivery receipt mechanism for the army of Amazon's last mile contractors. The panopticon eye effect of the Ring network appears to be just another externality foisted on society by Mega Corp.

Thank you, my cat mysteriously returned one day :) It was a weird experience, and I don't even look 'weird' (at least as far as I'm aware!).

If you had a Ring, you would have most likely gotten clues about your cat.

If you had asked your neighbors nicely to view their Ring history, you would have mostly likely gotten even more clues or even found your cat.

If he had a police squad patrolling in front of his house he would’ve also gotten clues about his cat I guess.

And it’s hard to ask something nicely to someone that doesn’t even answer based on your looks or whatever.

Seeing a cat pass on a video feed is unlikely to tell you where your cat is.

I find this viewpoint very strange. Why are you jumping to the idea that you're being treated as suspicious, and being judged, and being avoided as a result of that judgement?

What if people were just...doing something else? At work? At the movies? Driving? Pooping?

Do you feel judged when you walk up to doors with peepholes?

Because when you can hear that people are clearly in, and you know yourv video feed is available to them, and no one answers the door after waiting and ringing twice, it's a reasonable conclusion. Especially when this seems to be a feature of those with Ring doorbells.

Sure, but you're assuming it is something about you which prevents them from answering the door. Maybe they just get a lot of door to door salesmen and ignore the door bell when they aren't expecting anyone.

You should keep your cat inside and not leave it free to roam the neighborhood killing wildlife, and then going to disturb your neighbors when it does exactly what a cat does and runs away.

I wasn't asking for your opinion or your judgement.

Neither were your neighbors.

I haven't been offering my judgement or opinion to or on my neighbours. My judgement is on the device, and to be honest, I might well have installed one of these devices without realising how it may make others feel.

The story about the cat was just a background line to give context for why I was calling on my neighbours, but it could be any number of reasons, I might even have been saying hello after moving into the area. That's not enough information for you to judge, or to know that we picked up the cat as a stray and took it in, but it is very much an outdoor cat and we're ok with that - it is after all, where we found it.

Are you always so judgemental and critical?

It would have been better for local wildlife to take the stray cat to the pound, rather than just enabling it but letting it roam regardless.

I was against Ring cameras because of the privacy implications, but the neighbors that own Ring cameras being the ones that managed to avoid being interrogated about a "lost" stray cat is the most convincing argument in support of them that I can imagine.

If your houses are close together I don't think it's reasonable to have an expectation of privacy on the driveway or front porch. After all sound at normal speaking volume can easily travel 100 feet on a quiet day, if there's nothing in-between.

Its more than reasonable. It's called respect.

Their house and their drive and just because voice could travel 100-feet sill doesn't mean they have the right to record it.

If the speed limit is twenty and someone is driving thirty, does that give you the right to drive thirty too?

You're comparing apples and oranges. One is legal and the other isn't.

They absolutely have the right to record audio that is audible on their property. It used to be the norm that if you don't want your neighbors hearing you the onus is on you to speak quietly in a private place. With the increase in such devices the norm too will shift to "know that a device is recording audio in certain zones"

Is there a "you're both wrong and I hope you live far away from me" option?

One should travel about the same speed as all the other traffic and one should not record people without their express consent regardless of the law.

The behavior both you and the person you replying to are advocating for are just examples of being a jerk within the letter of the law.

I agree but to a point. I am curious how this plays out when what is recorded wouldn't necessarily be audible or intelligible by the human ear but is able to be picked up and amplified via post processing or more sensitive devices.

Will we then just have to always assume that a device is recording audio in all zones?

Countermeasures will be figured out, but it's an interesting thought process.

It's a scary thought process, but yes - you will have to assume it and technical[1], not legal countermeasures will be thought out.

Sure, one can have laws, but these kinds of laws are incredibly hard to enforce when it becomes trivial for everyone and their grandmother to break the law. It's frankly much easier to police Lyft/Uber usage than this.

[1] Cone of Silence from Get Smart...?

That's not exactly true. Many states have laws outlawing recording "private" conversations without the consent of all parties. As far as I know that would even include recording someone having a private conversation with you on your own property. Whether or not someone talking on their own property and their voice carrying over their property line would qualify is up for debate.

That's actually a good point. I'd like to see if someone has done an analysis on this. Factors to consider:

- Whether the recording was intentional (i.e. if I set up cameras for security, and it so happens to record all your conversations on your front porch, this is unintentional, but if I set up a microphone by the wall, it's intentional).

- The type of communication - most resources I'm finding discuss phones and similar channels.

From what I could find:

I just checked one state: Video recordings are fine, but if they capture the audio of the conversation, then it's a violation of the law.

Other places define a violation of reasonable expectation of privacy to require an explicit intent to eavesdrop - so if it's a side effect of my security system, it's not illegal.

In a number of states, your front porch or backyard are not considered private places. If the conversation is between you and someone else (not the neighbor), then by federal law, intentionally recording the conversation is illegal (neither party consented). When it's unintentional, it'll probably vary from state to state.

In most places they can point the cameras onto the exterior of your property. But if it can see inside a bedroom (even if the window is open and no curtains are drawn), it can be a violation.

Interesting side effect of searching for this: Video monitoring of your baby may be illegal!

I wonder if these laws run afoul of the ADA - You can't do zero-party consent audio recordings - but you can record video, which could just as easily capture a deaf person's conversation using sign language. Basically, it sounds like this law affords protections to only certain, non-disabled citizens.

I agree the parent is wrong that they do have the “right” (really more it’s not-illegal) but don’t think it doesn’t mean it’s not unreasonable and obnoxious.

There's a huge difference between casually overhearing a conversation because you also are outside versus having actions/words recorded for eternity, and potentially analyzed by a third party (Amazon, Google, etc).

I'd say an apt comparison would be a neighbor occasionally hearing what you're saying (and possibly cozying up to their closed front door to listen), versus your neighbor coming out onto the porch every time you're talking, attempting to join the conversation, and even filming you with their cell phone to share with their friends. The latter is wildly socially unacceptable, and at the very least we'd shun someone who did this. Unfortunately most people seem to ignore electronic devices in their social analysis.

I'm not sure I agree - if you have the right to observe, listen and record using your meat implements (eyes, ears, brain), then you should have the right to do so using a digital augmentation of the same (cameras, microphones, storage).

Why? Can you explain why the two should be treated the same?

That‘s not at all the case in many other legal contexts.

Because there is no clear distinction between the two. You're certainly entitled to listen with your ears and write things down aren't you? Can you use a hearing aid to help you listen? What about binoculars to help you see?

Clearly it's impolite to peer into your neighbours windows with binoculars, and gossip about all the conversations you overhear with your hearing aids, but you've got the right to do so, don't you?

What about observing your neighbours through a peep hole in your door (or wall)? What about setting up a camera instead of a peep hole? And what if you want to see the camera feed from your phone? Reference it for later? Where is the line? All of these, including pens and paper, are technological augmentations to our innate capabilities. I'm not against banning them per se, I'd just like a clear idea of why we ban some and not others.

> I'd just like a clear idea of why we ban some and not others.

Can you think of any reasons why we would want to ban some and not others? It reminds a bit of something that Emma Goldman might say: people have only as much liberty as they have the intelligence to want and the courage to take.

I can't think of any deontological reasons, no. It seems to me that people are just more apprehensive of the more recent innovations. I can point you to writings in the past advising what to avoid writing down. This taboo has clearly shifted.

Say in 1000 years from now everyone has cameras and storage media implanted in their persons, I suspect the public consciousness surrounding what is and isn't expected to be recorded would change. I don't however think that your fundamental liberty as a human being should depend on the public consciousness, but rather be derived from principles/axioms.

Pardon my ignorance, but I thought deontology evaluates actions by measuring them against a set of rules. I find it hard to believe that you can't imagine any rules that would prohibit filming someone else's home.

And infringing on this imagined-from-first-principles right would cause serious repercussions. No regulation could ever be as beneficial as losing this imagined-from-first-principles right. We must let corporations and the police state that serve them have and use this data.

It's not imagined-from-first-principles, it's in fact attempting to define the very axioms that ought to constrain law in the first place. What does it mean to be "free" do something?

If you avoid this question, you can justify just about any tyranny so long as it can be argued to be "beneficial" (spoiler alert: this is how the worst atrocities in history have been justified). In other words, the ends don't justify the means.

I think there's a difference between "expectation to not be incidentally seen or overheard" and "expectation to not be under constant surveillance".

Privacy doesn't have to be a binary, GP probably expected a modicum of it in that they assumed their conversations could be heard by their neighbours should they be listening in at the time, but is uncomfortable at the idea of a digital record of each audible outdoor conversation being kept in perpetuity, that the neighbours and any third parties with access the footage could use against them if their relationship went sour (which it now seems it has...). The "expectation of privacy" argument should really only be used when discussing whether recording should be legal, not when determining whether someone is a jackass according to social norms.

You got it. I'm on my front porch, and clearly anyone on the street walking by could hear me. But to know that it's possible to record my entire conversation is creepy.

I've learned my lesson and now invite people to our backyard, which is free of any cameras.

That’s probably legally true in the US, but is that the best we can do?

It’s valid to question the value of laws. Sometimes I wish I did have more privacy in public.

But more importantly, technology has completely changed what non-privacy looks like and is tragic to me that laws haven’t caught up.

There’s a huge practical difference between “someone within 100ft, probably a neighbour who I know, might hear me and probably instantly forget what I said, but 99% of the time no one is there” and “100% of your conversations are recorded, transcribed, and stored forever by a profit-maximising behemoth with various other unavoidable tentacles into my life, and also they might sell or give that data to other companies also the police”.

This is a similar problem with data brokers... yes my records are public, but for most of history that meant going down to city hall and putting forth effort... should the law around public records be different when data brokers vacuum up all that public data and resell it digitally? We've lost many practical barriers to privacy.

Incidentally overhearing a conversation and recording 24/7 then uploading anything interesting to a third party's servers for them to do who knows what with it feels very different.

I'm curious what others think of the ethics of a non-internet connected camera? Does that really resolve the issue or do you still consider it wrong to have residential security cameras that capture the sidewalk/street outside the house?

I think it’s not as bad as it removes many of the worst elements, but I also think there is a question of how limited/incidental the surveillance is of other people: e.g. I think there is a difference between picking up people on the sidewalk on the 20ft or so directly in front of your house, vs having the camera also pickup wide angle view of the whole street and all of your neighbor’s comings and goings.

I really wanted to avoid any legal issues with them. We decided talking/texting is best. My wife is a litigator, and even she didn't want to go there.

If you share a wall with a neighbor, it's always best to try and resolve things through direct communication. Our kids still play together, and they still come over and vice versa.

I made my point, and they actually engaged in helping mitigate my concerns. I certainly can't ask them to remove their camera, so that's why we took this approach. They met us half way, but clearly felt something more when one of them over reacted.

Laws are the lowest common denominator of social behavior. Not illegal - does not mean it’s not anti-social behavior.

I also the think there is a practical difference between occasionally/potentially being observed when entering/leaving your property, and having your comings and goings surveilled 24/7/365

I would be having some fun.

Friend: Have you any success bringing your neighbors on board.

Me: There's been a setback. They're currently not speaking with me.

Friend: That is unfortunate. We're talking a lot of money.

Me: I know. I'll fix it.

Friend: You better.

"Have they found the gold that was burried in their backyard by the previous owners?"

I've wrote about it before on HN, but a local busybody saw me committing the crime of walking down the street in my own neighborhood on their Ring camera and used that as pretext for calling the cops on me, who then harassed me for being "suspicious" without having actually looked at the footage themselves at all.

Unsurprisingly, I am not a fan of the surveillance state that's found itself at my literal doorstep.

For what it's worth, that same neighbor could have called the cops to harass you after seeing you walking with their own eyeballs, or the ancient art of lying to the cops that they saw anything at all. The presence of the Ring in this story adds nothing to the risk scenario

I've been walking in the neighborhoods I've lived in everyday for literal decades, and this only became a problem recently.

The difference here is that Ring and its companion apps like Neighbors continuously send their users scary alerts and video clips of innocuous neighborhood activities they'd otherwise miss entirely, or just ignore. I see this all the time with such apps like Nextdoor and Neighbors, where in the past loud sounds in the summer would be written off as fireworks and ignored, but now we have legions of people working themselves into frenzies about how "gun shots" were detected, with calls to action for video evidence of the "perpetrators". What then happens is that people start sharing clips of their neighbors doing essentially nothing and accusing them of actually committing crimes.

Sounds like your real problem is your neighbor being a jerk. If they didn't have Ring that wouldn't stop them from calling the cops on a "suspicious" person.

I think there's a big difference between a busybody staring out the window sometimes and being upset with what they see versus a busybody with a 24/7 security system that pings them at all hours of the day with alerts and video clips about "suspicious" activity it detects, along with apps like Nextdoor, Citizen and the Ring Neighbors app that allow the paranoid to continuously share said clips and create local echo chambers of paranoia, suspicion and distrust.

In this case we have no idea whether that happened, or whether the crappy neighbor was just looking out their window at that moment. It is silly to blame a doorbell camera for this.

When the cops that stopped me bring up the fact that I was acting "suspicious" according to a neighbor's Ring recording, I can easily blame the doorbell camera for the interaction.

There are multiple homes near me that just point cameras straight out into the street, recording everyone else's comings and goings. This seems deeply anti-social to me, not much different from spying on the neighbors with binoculars. Meanwhile, police in San Francisco now propose that they should have realtime access to private networked surveillance systems: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32077528

I don't mind people in my neighborhood running security cameras as long as they store the footage locally. I can't consent to the terms that a managed service provider presents them with respect to footage I am in or conversations I have. I am concerned that given a sizeable enough populace with locally stored footage, that it could become the target of robo-warrants for proxy-surveillance, but we're a bit off from that.

The reason I support people running their own security cameras is because I recently had a woman go off on some wild diatribe about how my property looked (which actually belongs to my landlord) and she became very upset to the point of trying to force my front gate open as I shut it. Since then she's gone on some proxy wars with other people in the neighborhood. Obviously her behavior will continue to escalate and because I have no cameras I have no way to show she was willing to use force and intimidation from step 1.

I wonder if this Ultrasound Directional Jammer would be the right mix of legal and proportionate.

https://www.tinytxs.com/products/ultrasonic-jammer

Depending where you live this might be illegal. In the U.K. you have an obligation not to record your neighbour’s property, and not to record conversations of members of the public.

A related article appeared earlier, and I submitted it,

Dystopian doorbells: how the humble door buzzer turned into mass surveillance network

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32079896

https://www.standard.co.uk/homesandproperty/property-news/vi...

A very interesting piece of info is that «microphones that can pick up audio from up to 25 feet away». The Evening Standard is a British newspaper, and the article tackles the legal matters, but does not mention audio recording. Maybe an overlook, or maybe concerned people should check the audio related regulations further.

> Video doorbell owners must be careful not to place their cameras in areas where they might breach neighbours’ privacy. Any footage detected outside of your property is likely to breach UK General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) laws

The ICO[1] and case law[2] corroborate that audio recording outside your property with CCTV is generally prohibited.

[1] https://ico.org.uk/your-data-matters/domestic-cctv-systems-g...

[2] https://www.icaew.com/library/subject-gateways/law/legal-ale...

Yet every local facebook group is full of the curtain twitchers posting pictures of "person walking past, looks suspicious, keep save everyone x" in blatant disregard for the law, yet nothing happens

Yes that’s reserved for the government only.

I think you can set up a video camera pretty much anywhere you want, but there are a lot of laws about audio recording. I would check on your state's laws. I don't even think this would be covered by 1-party consent.

The front porch is a "public" area, in the sense that there's no expectation of privacy. It's as legal as if you were taking an iphone video or live photo of your car in the driveway and happened to catch the neighbor in the background.

Ring does have the ability to set "blackout zones" in the camera's FOV, and as a good neighbor the ring owner could have excluded the neighbor's driveway/porch with a few clicks.

The front porch is a "public" area, in the sense that there's no expectation of privacy.

Parent commenter is correct. The laws in your area are not the laws in every area. Some states and cities have restrictions on recording, even in public areas.

Illinois is one of the states with laws that prohibit many kinds of incidental audio recordings, while video is allowed. As was explained to me by a downstate communications lawyer, it's because the laws were passed by mobbed-up politicians before video was a thing, in order to protect mobsters from federal investigations.

Even today, when you see undercover recordings taken by local TV news stations in Illinois, there's never any audio.

No they aren't. Intent matters.

According to this article [0] by the senior counsel and ethics officer for the Illinois Department of Central Management Services,

> The threshold questions are whether the conversation is private, and whether the recording is done secretly. The law allows recording if the conversation is not private, that is, there is no reasonable expectation of privacy as defined above. Also, there is no violation unless the recording is “surreptitious,” defined as “obtained or made by stealth or deception, or executed through secrecy or concealment.”

[0] https://www.isba.org/committees/governmentlawyers/newsletter...

You cannot record voice in Illinois for example. I'm pretty sure this is the case for most all party consent states.

If you post a video with voice online you are breaking the law in Illinois, unless all parties gave you consent. I don't even know how something like RING camera is legal since it is being uploaded to the cloud and the parties don't consent to it.

Edit: Illinois actually made some changes to the law, that allows recording of voice in public spaces.

This is one of the perennial tug-of-wars in the general principle "Your rights end where my nose begins."

If you're emitting pressure waves or reflecting radiation flux and it crosses into my property, am I allowed to record and analyze it? And both the law and morality basically say "kinda, maybe, I dunno, depends." To wit: it's generally considered gauche to take photographs of you doing harmless things in your backyard, but if you're building a meth lab back there, you can be certain a neighbor will take photos and submit them as evidence. But how do they know it's a meth lab without looking in the first place?

The rights and responsibilities around data storage and analysis are context-specific and complicated.

> I asked them to point their front porch camera so that it doesn't record my front driveway, just theirs. and they lost their shit.

My sister has cameras on the outside of our house. When neighbors asked her to point them away from their houses, my sister also lost her shit. Even when the police came by, she got so upset that the police re-aimed her cameras when they got her distracted.

For some reason people who get involved in shootings try to hide their guns in our neighborhood (there are some unique cars and unique landscaping in this neighborhood). Her cameras have resulted in the police recovering about a dozen guns during 2021 and several arrests when the perps come by a few hours later to pick them up.

Holy crap - that’s not the rAndom porch pirate!

I have a non-Ring doorbell camera and while I can't prove it has deterred theft, it's pretty useful in at least:

* Getting a partial face/partial vehicle ID of someone who stole our package

* Seeing the sneaky method in which they stole the package (allowing me to talk to neighbors warning them about the method used)

* Getting a private instant announcement of who exactly is at the door (if they've been here before and they're in my contacts)

* Notifying us while on vacation that someone out of the ordinary is at the door (and being able to speak to them as if we were home)

* Deterring raccoons (bright light on the front of the camera)

Not-so-useful things:

* Seeing the large number of cars that like to use our driveway to make a U-turn

There is an option to turn off audio recording and all footage is encrypted.

In Belgium that would be illegal. It's even illegal to point it at a public space such as the road.

Only your own property is allowed.

I asked them to point their front porch camera so that it doesn't record my front driveway

Ring also lets you set up privacy blocks on recorded footage, so you could ask them to black out your driveway.

I did that with the camera that shows my driveway, due to the curve of the driveway, it also shows part of the neighbor's house, so I blacked out their windows in the camera feed. I sent them a screenshot and asked if they wanted me to black out their entire yard, but they were fine with my video capturing any activity in their little used side yard.

Depending on the state you live in, e.g. California has two party consent to record audio, meaning if you don't consent then what they're doing is illegal.

These only apply to private conversation, and not ones occurred in public (i.e. it's fair game to record the driveway, but not the backyard).

Is your front porch "public"? Usually things like this hinge on a reasonable expectation of privacy and I think a conversation at your front door can be expected to be relatively private.

are you certain this applies to things occuring in public? IANAL but it strains reason to believe it's illegal for cameras in public to have audio recording enabled.

It's probably illegal too. It's illegal in most states to record conversations unless you have consent from one or all parties in the conversation.

But will anyone actually enforce the law?

I haven't been following this very closely, but my assumption is that the proliferation of recording devices have rendered these laws impractical to enforce, thus somewhat moot.

Single party recording is legal in 38 states.

https://fireflies.ai/blog/call-recording-laws-in-50-states-3...

It's also specific to phone call recording. Nothing about recording the audio of someone talking outside your house.

First-- this is a summary of statutes for recording phone calls; the laws are not always the same in each jurisdiction for making an audio recording in public.

And we're in a thread where someone is describing a scenario where neighbor A records person B talking to child C. Neighbor A is not a party to the conversation. Whether a state has a one party or two party statute, this behavior would likely violate it.

>> Whether a state has a one party or two party statute, this behavior would likely violate it.

Fascinating. How does Ring get around this? Has no one tried to sue to force the issue?

It might be hard to sue Ring; they'd claim they were not responsible for capturing a neighbor conversation and it's intended for use on your own property.

And to sue the neighbor, well, you'd have to know that they actually were capturing your conversation and feel like suing your neighbor.

The neighbor isn't a party to the conversation though?

My guess is that only applies to private conversations? If you're talking with someone in public (and arguably the outside of your property is public) do they need your permission to record you?

I’m sympathetic to your privacy concerns (neighbors shouldn't be recording much of your space although some may be unavoidable if you are close by).

You really lose me with this, though:

> I believe these cameras haven't decreased crime. They also don't really add more security.

Based on what?

Extremely bright IR lamp that flickers randomly at night? They'll get a lot of notifications.

I just got a Ring cam and during setup it asks if you'd like to black out any regions to prevent recording neighbors, so that may be an option they just aren't aware of. Doesn't solve the audio issue if they aren't willing to disable it though.

do we know this is respected for the material they eagerly/secretly fork over to piggies?

Yes, in fact, during the engagement, they even showed us where the camera trigger zone is, which they reduced to their driveway, and even added the blackout region for when I'm on my porch, as the wide angle of the lens made it impossible to point it away from my front porch. They were really cooperative and I tried to ensure that I wasn't being demanding.

I even tried to meet them half way and said you can keep recording audio and video, now that I understand the trigger zone, but I was met with hostility the next day when I saw one of them in person.

Although, even with the trigger zone, they can just live stream it anyways, not that they are that kind of people, but clearly, I struck a nerve with them. I am still friends with one of them, and all their kids. So it's just one family member that sees things differently.

> I believe these cameras haven't decreased crime. They also don't really add more security. It's a shame though they are everywhere, with disregard for privacy right on people's property. So yes, I'm biased. I have no love for Ring.

Impossible to believe with the ubiquity that they haven't decreased crime. Or at least certain types of crimes.

Prior to this type of video only a small amount of people had security cameras and generally they were easily spotted.

Today anyone committing (again a certain type of) crime knows that if they drive into a neighborhood or walk around they will be on a camera somewhere and multiple times. That has to have an impact even if there isn't data to prove it.

I live downtown. The same "folks" that steal things, that I've seen for a better part of a decade, drug addictions and all, still steal stuff. It's just the police are not going to bother with it. One of them tried to steal our plant! Yes, our $5 plant. But I caught them in person, and they apologized, but they were high on some drugs.

No camera will deter someone like that.

Ha, you'd hate me. I have cameras pointing out the front of my house that record my driveway, the road, and incidentally the neighbor's driveways and front yards and such. No audio, though.

But they're all cool with it, so there's that.

I wouldn't hate you! :) Clearly you've engaged your neighbors if they are cool with it. You also mentioned no audio. I even told them it's fine with audio, now that I understood how the system works. Alas, no audio is obviously better as I don't have to ask my friends to walk further away from the line of side of the camera.

Yeah audio is sketchy, I don't want to record that anyway. The impetus for the whole thing was my neighbors having a porch pirate experience. We all got together and since I'm the only nerd in this immediate area, I got nominated to run a couple cameras in case it ever happens again. Not like it'd likely result in anybody being caught, we're realistic about it, but still.

Depending on your state and country, you may have a legal angle here if you care, see: https://recordinglaw.com/party-two-party-consent-states/

I believe it's the reason Nest defaults to not recording audio, because the law various by state, and even mixed within some states. For 2-party (all-party) states, you can't record audio on security cameras (or at least it's a bad idea, and likely illegal).

>>For 2-party (all-party) states, you can't record audio on security cameras (or at least it's a bad idea, and likely illegal).

You can record audio in public, and a street facing audio recording is low risk, unless the microphone is so sensitive that there is an argument you are picking up audio from, for example, a neighbor's back yard. I think a sign indicating audio and video recording is sensible.

That said, a backyard facing camera has real risks about the video and certainly the audio coverage. A reasonable person would not use audio recording and would carefully manage coverage to exclude neighbor's private spaces.

No, I'm quite certain the parent comment is correct. I'm only familiar with Florida's laws on the subject but I've personally had to deal with setting up intermittent audio recording in a "public" area (private business but not a room that anyone would think is "private") and state law was very clear that we had to make sure there was some reasonable signage to notify anyone entering the area that audio recording was being used.

A sign indicating audio recording was taking place is directly comparable to the standard "This call is being recorded for quality assurance" that's ubiquitous on corporate call queues. That's reasonable enough for consent in the context of security cams. If someone wants to talk on your doorstep after seeing the notice that's reasonable enough, if you don't consent then don't go up to the camera and talk about some private subject.

Unfortunately this is a reason for single family homes on large lots. Privacy. I have large hedges between me and my neighbors which block visuals and all but the loudest noises.

Floodlights are great for security and I like the cams to get a notification when packages arrive or to see if I closed the garage or if there v is any suspicious persons coming on my property, etc. Wyze has great AI person and package detection from my usage. I don’t actively monitor video unless something happened that warranted it. I also do not put it in places that it can pick up neighbors private moments.

There is only one way to reach the mindset of a person like that and that is to install your own cameras on your property and face all of them at his house. Any of them that you can face directly into his windows the better. This may get negative attention here on HN but sometimes a pissing contest is the only way to get through to someone. You already tried the nice approach.

I understand your concern, but if it’s something that can be seen/heard from the next property over, I don’t know that you can reasonably expect such things to be private.

Although now I’m imagining this taken to the extreme, like if your neighbors set up a 24/7 HD video feed with a hyperbolic microphone etc aimed directly at your front porch. That sort of behavior is certainly weird.

I see where you're coming from, but in the US at least there is no legal right to privacy outside/in public. That Amazon can and will turn over recordings - possibly without even a warrant - is horrifying. But that's basically the reality in the UK with CCTV.

Should something be done about it? Sure. But that's where we are.

I'm pretty sure its against the law to have a camera pointed at someone else's property like that.

Can confirm I use them to watch my kids. I don't think they provide any security / can't imagine they would.

Having said that the cameras only trigger recording action that happens on my property. Other places might appear in view but they don't trigger a recording.

Why not take some active measures? Bright IR light directed at the camera. Maybe there's an ultrasonic noise that would effectively disable the mic. I assume there's an auto gain control so a loud enough (but inaudible to us) sound might do it.

It would be a crime for you to use an air pellet rifle and sabotage the device. It would also be a crime if you used spray paint for the same end. I suspect the cameras are sensitive to IR light blinding them, but again, any kind of sabotage could be criminal.

Ring will gladly send them a free replacement.

If feasible a physical barrier on the porch along your property line might be the simplest option. Simply block the line of sight, and optionally install white noise generators on your side to mask noise.

Something to consider would be pointing a directed beam of sound towards the microphone. Bonus points if it’s an endless loop of you saying “I like to spy on my neighbors” over and over again.

You have no right not to be recorded in public in my opinion. You're the one shooting photons onto their property (the camera) that they should be able to do what they want with.

So I should be able to peer through your bathroom’s window because you’re shooting photons outside?

if I left it open, yes.

Depending on where you live you might have recourse since they are recording audio.I would look into wiretapping laws for your state.

It sounds like it is time for a white noise generator, right on the property line and make sure they don't hear anything.

You made a reasonable request, and they should have complied with an 'oh yeah, sure, sorry.'

Is there a way to trigger this so that it is always on? Something like a white noise generator?

I would think (alas, I'm not a lawyer) that that's outright illegal in most of Europe.

You could mount a small laser pointer in your window pointing directly into their camera.

Wild, don't you have any laws against this? Here in CZ(EU), you can't put camera facing public property just like that, I don't even mention facing private property of somebody else, lol. Even camera facing your property and like corner of view is public property, I can send formal complaint to "GDPR" bureau, they will warn the property owner, if nothing happens, fine incoming which can be pretty huge.

Absurd. The right to record in public, which this is, should be respected.

I don't know about your US "rights". But here it's illegal to record somebody without permission and store it somewhere. Basically against GDPR.

Of course, as a property owner you can request cameras facing public space, but you must be GDPR compliant then and you're put into register and anybody can requests deletion. Also you must provide valid reason for this request.

To me(us) is absurd that you can record private citizens and do whatever you want with it. Ridiculous.

That said, my neighbors did catch a bike thief with one of those. Even got the bike back.

Robert Frost first coined the saying, "Good Fences Make Good Neighbors."

> Amazon isn't exactly the king of privacy

Is there something specific you’re talking about?

Did you steal the bicycles...

I have this theory that cameras do not reduce crime because "amount" of crime depends on supply of people willing to do crime.

If you are a person that is willing to do crime and you see a camera, you do not stop doing crime. You find another target.

> I believe these cameras haven't decreased crime.

They are the crime

This type of thing is actually one of the cases were GDPR has been enforced, although it varies from country to country. Seems CCTV is most heavily enforced in Spain.

Go to https://www.enforcementtracker.com/ and filter by "CCTV," a few are for residential cases, e.g. https://www.enforcementtracker.com/ETid-1226.

Their crossing the street to avoid you is a confession of having spied on you deliberately. It's their kame-hame-ha of scorn, they have to do it because otherwise you'll see what they've been peeking at, means they're guilty as shit.

Most likely. I certainly didn't bring any of that up, nor will I. I've spoken to this person on a couple of occasions since then for some other matters that were urgent, and they didn't run away. But I'm not going to engage them to talk about the weather. So hopefully they mature and see that they overreacted.

> I asked them to point their front porch camera so that it doesn't record my front driveway, just theirs. and they lost their shit.

Wear a mask, and smear it with peanut butter. Or spraypaint.

Or, since they are wifi based devices, do a deauth attack against all devices on their network. The Rings don't have much of a local storage buffer.

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