While the technical limitations of the Always Home Cam certainly help maintain some semblance of privacy-mindedness on the part of Ring, the camera still sets a problematic precedent. To respond, I agree that the Ring Always Home Cam is a better option than installing cameras in your bathrooms, though bathroom cams (which are largely illegal in public restrooms precisely for privacy reasons) are not the standard against which we should hold up our home security devices. there is an emergency involving danger of death or serious injury" (emphasis added).
Along the way, experts have raised alarms at the ethical slippage occurring: Coordinated video surveillance, curated by Amazon and even partially accessible to police, represents a major blow to privacy.įinally, the representative offered the usual response about cooperation with police: "Ring receives and responds to legally binding law enforcement requests for user information on a regular basis … disclose video recordings unless necessary to comply with the law or. Ring has partnered with hundreds of police forces across the country in efforts to reduce crime (although, as we've reported, the evidence suggests such cooperation does not reduce crime rates). I would be surprised to see Amazon's cam drone not offering proactive monitoring in response to certain noises when it releases next year.īut such features only raise more questions, and serious ones at that.
#Ring drone security camera plus
But Amazon has been systematically extending the independence and reach of its home technology, making Alexa in particular more proactive and predictive.Īlexa Guard and Guard Plus listen for a wide range of noises like glass breaking and footfalls, and Amazon is expanding the voice assistant's ability to respond to such noises, too - including babies crying, dogs barking, people snoring and more. And the drone only patrols when you tell it to. Sure, the camera is blocked while docked. Importantly, the cam's cost isn't just $250. The Always Home Cam will release in 2021 for $250. Google says it can serve up results, from ads to restaurant recommendations, informed in part by what it knows about your preferences. The idea is, the more data you let a tech giant access, the better they can help you: Google's services, from Search to Gmail to Google Maps, are prime examples of this trade-off at work.
The trade-off at the core of most privacy debates pits convenience against access to your data. Ring insists its new camera is secure and private, and with a launch date of "early 2021" you won't have to worry about it this year, but regardless of the particulars at release, the Always Home Cam is a bad precedent. Yes, the Ring Always Home Cam can literally undock, hover into a given room and record footage of, say, a break-in.ĭepending on your point of view, Ring's new drone cam could be a symbol of a shining, robotic future, or it could be a harbinger of darker days ahead. Read more: Amazon's smart products lead the market even as trust in the company lagsĪmazon's fall hardware event has come and gone, and as usual, it delivered a jetstream of announcements, including new Echo smart speakers, an all-new cloud gaming platform and - perhaps most interestingly - a flying camera drone from Amazon's home security brand, Ring. You can read a recap on our event coverage page. 28, 2021: Amazon hosted an event today to show off the latest editions to its growing lineup of devices as well as updates on its services.
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