Ring founder Jamie Siminoff is back at the helm of the surveillance doorbell company, and with him is the surveillance-first-privacy-last approach that made Ring one of the most maligned tech devices. Not only is the company reintroducing new versions of old features which would allow police to request footage directly from Ring users, it is also introducing a new feature that would allow police to request live-st
Why do people want to see who comes to the door?
My brother installed one of these at his house and it makes me uncomfortable, but I know he probably feels safer and more in control by having it, and would value that over my comfort.
Then I start to gaslight myself, “why am I uncomfortable with the surveillance apparatus getting regular identifiable videos of me at a known location”?
Why would you not want to see who is at your door? Or know if there is a package there? Plenty of packages get stolen off of porches in my neighborhood
We had a burglary a couple of months ago, luckily we have an indoor camera which scared him away when he saw it and nothing was stolen. On the camera recording, we heard that he was ringing the doorbell for a couple of minutes to check if anyone is at home. We now have a camera doorbell (not Ring one though), if we had it then he would see it and avoided our house altogether.
Yeah we have a camera pointed at our driveway from our garage door. It isn’t close enough to the road to trigger movement from people walking or driving by.
But if they come inside the fence it’ll pick em up.
Also have a couple of cameras watching other random parts of the yard. We live on just under 2 acres, and it’s all enclosed in chain link fencing. Next to us is an automotive maintenance shop owned by a by here pay here lot a few miles closer to town, and they don’t always hire the most trustworthy individuals to work on cars…
This seems to be exclusively American thing. I presume it’s a big safety issue there. Here in Thailand people rarely even lock their doors let alone care about something like video doorbells.
Because of porch pirates.
I don’t like being under constant surveillance from my neighbors doorbell cameras. This is one of many excellent reasons why.
What I am going to do is use MapComplete to start labeling every house that I come across that has one of these doorbells.
Then I’ll post some QR codes around town that link to the map.
Once people start seeing their homes called out on a map then perhaps some of them will feel uncomfortable with that and start to understand just why privacy matters.
I feel like this could backfire if lots of people have the cameras. They might be like, so what? Cameras are normal.
Or worse, thieves will see who doesn’t have them and plan their hits accordingly.
LoL, do it!
Who could have guessed that having billionaire owned always on surveillance device in your home would lead to this
It’s not like there’s been dozens of people warning about it in the last few years. People deserve what they get.
So, what are people using to get:
- good quality streaming
- doorbell alert
- motion alerts
- local and remote access
- recording storage
Currently using Ring (outside of America) and looking to migrate away. There are some nice other features like distinguishing motion vs people vs vehicles that are nice to have but can live without.
I have a piezoelectric doorbell.
The bell part plugs directly into a wall socket. The button part is completely wireless and batteryless and is affixed near my front door.
Been working like clockwork for a decade to let me know when someone is at the door and I’m home.
If I’m not home, the postman or delivery driver leaves a note to go to the collection center for my package. If it’s a small package not requiring signature, they just leave it at the door or in the mailbox if it fits. None of that changes with a camera.
Why overcomplicate life.
The best thing is you don’t need any of that. Just install normal doorbell. We all love gadgets but some of them are just not worth it.
Hard agree. What does a video doorbell connected to the internet solve? I’m concerned that people dont trust their neighbors to this extent. Sort of a canary in the coal mine type thing.
I don’t have a doorbell of any kind (the button isn’t even hooked up to anything). My neighbours are jerks but they won’t steal packages or anything like that.
We’re living in a low trust society that used to be a high trust society a few decades ago. I believe all of the problems you see in politics ultimately stem from this. Factionalism is tearing western society apart.
I think some people also think they need it because they order way too much junk from the internet but it’s really just an indication of bad habits. If it’s for security a single camera doorbell is definitely not adequate solution either.
What does a video doorbell connected to the internet solve? I’m concerned that people dont trust their neighbors to this extent. Sort of a canary in the coal mine type thing.
It’s not that I don’t trust my neighbors, I don’t trust anyone outside of those I personally know well.
Growing up around people who abuse hard drugs tends to destroy the trust you have in those around you after you have your shit stolen repeatedly. Both my wife and I had shit stolen from closed front porches when we were growing up, so I have cameras that watch the sides of my house. But I also built my system from scratch, so I am not worried about third party snooping/reporting.
Plenty of us have good reasons not to trust those around us. Especially in this day and age of terrorists walking around with state authority.
Neighbors can be people you dont well, you should still trust them anyways, because you’d want them to treat you the same.
If you have drug addicts regularly causing you problems, might do you some good to befriend them in some way or help them out, instead of secure your shit and avoid them more. They aren’t any different than you are.
If you’re still talking about getting shit stolen off your porch, anyone within driving distance could be responsible for it.
Do you really think it’s possible to try to become friends with or “help out” every asshole within a 10 minute drive of where you live? Or even identify everyone in that range who might have sticky fingers?
Not concerned about porch pirates at all, people shouldnt order stuff like this.
Not concerned about porch pirates at all
Not everyone has been blessed with the same gift of blissful ignorance that you have.
I agree that people shouldn’t order Ring, it’s a shitty product for the reasons laid out in this thread and article. But “just be nicer to everyone around you” is not a viable alternative, and suggesting it is dismissive of the realities other people are living.
I grew up around drug addicts, and in my experience, befriending them doesn’t protect your shit. I had my PS3 stolen by a dude we showed nothing but kindness too when he needed a fix. Don’t get me wrong, addicts can be super chill people, but they’ll still steal from you when they need to get high.
Friend, family or stranger, don’t kid yourself that they won’t steal from you
Never said it would protect your shit, just that it likely would be better in the long run for everyone involved. Its not an easy problem to solve but I dont think we need to treat people poorly because of it. I understand if its just not possible to assume the financial risk though.
Never said it would protect your shit, just that it likely would be better in the long run for everyone involved. Its not an easy problem to solve but I dont think we need to treat people poorly because of it.
Just because I don’t trust those around me and use cameras doesn’t mean I treat people poorly. I am very respectful to the people who live and work around me, but that doesn’t mean I trust them not to take something that isn’t theirs.
Lack of trust does not equal disrespect, it just means I’ve seen the true side of a lot of people and don’t wish to let them take advantage of the kind of naivety that you display here.
I understand if its just not possible to assume the financial risk though
It’s not that I’m unable to assume the risk, I’m unwilling to be taken advantage of.
I use a $40 tp-link video doorbell and it has has all of that.
It’s solved tech and there are hundreds of alternatives so you can definitely find something local. I’ve heard Netatmo recommended for Europeans (French, gdpr compliant)
There are many other cameras but most have the same potential to do this sort of shit. Sending video to some server you don’t control, on cameras you don’t control because it’s proprietary, isn’t going to cut it if privacy is your goal.
No, most don’t do it.
What is the incentive to do this sort of stuff?
I recently adopted a dog who I want to monitor when I’m away from home. So I got a cheap motion tracking in-home camera with cloud storage, and AI identification for people and pets. The AI functions never fucking worked. I already had a Ring camera.
Did a bit of research after realising the cheapo camera was shit, and went for a eufy stack to replace the Ring doorbell and tbr shitty in-house camera.
I now have:
- eufy Video Doorbell
- eufy HomeBase 3, with an added 1TB of storage
- eufy IndoorCam C220
This gives me
- local storage for both cameras on the HomeBase.
- the HomeBase also gives you local AI for (individual) person, (general) pet, vehicle, and package identification. I haven’t tried the vehicle identification.
- streaming in the app for both cameras should work in 2k. I have it set to 1080p. It’s good enough for me.
- continuous recording is an option. I have it set to motion alerts because
- the app gives you motion and doorbell alerts. You can configure how much information you want in the notifications, to prevent video’s from passing through eufy’s servers.
Just bought a Reolink rln46 NVR and four cameras. I don’t have the doorbell, but every other feature you requested works flawlessly. It records 24/7 in 4K but can stream at lower resolutions if you want when you’re away from home on mobile. You can set what notifications you receive and when you want to receive them. You can even go back and search for events by type in the recorded video when they were never flagged for notification in the first place. I’ve been thoroughly impressed and plan to add to the system in the coming months.
I also use Reolink, including both the NVR and doorbell, and have been very pleased with it.
I mean, people are not being forced to buy this shit. So it’s on the idiots who think they have nothing to hide. Just Google something like “why are people ok with cameras inside their house “ and you’ll see many many people basically saying “don’t care, I have nothing to hide, everyone has a pussy/dick”
Right but if my neighbor across the street has one, my house is being surveilled a lot more than is theirs.
We still need to protect the idiots. Thats why we’re banning asbestos and have safety codes. How is this any different?
We need to protect uninformed people. You do this by informing them. If they know the risks and still decide they don’t care it’s their problem, not ours.
Not if they are willingly bringing this inside their homes. I think it’s very different from substances that you might not be aware are there and are highly toxic.
People who claim they don’t value privacy are simply ignorant of how this can affect them. They don’t consider the data falling into the wrong hands. Surely they don’t want criminals with unauthorized access at least. It should be obvious that governments don’t always have their best interests either.
I mean, you might think that but you underestimate how willing people are to give up their privacy and freedom just to feel safe.
Not even for feeling safe. For convenience is enough.
The cops can come to them to get video on you. So you’re impacted.
